


Quid Pro Quo

by yellow_smiley_face



Category: Hannibal (TV), The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Cannibalism, Chilton's still kicking, F/F, Flashbacks, Gen, Graphic depictions of Food, Hannibal's still a little shit, Like super post, M/M, Murder Husbands, Old Age, Plot Driven, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Prison Breaks, Psychoanalyzation, Retired!Jack, Separated Murder Husbands, Solitary Confinement, Wine Inspiration, dark!Will, time lapse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-24
Updated: 2016-06-27
Packaged: 2018-04-23 04:02:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 41,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4862342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yellow_smiley_face/pseuds/yellow_smiley_face
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A decade after their fall into the Atlantic, Hannibal and Will are yet again caught by the authorities. They are separated, imprisoned, and assured by the FBI that they will never see each other again. Yet when a string of murders compel the FBI to send a young officer, Clarice Starling, to go to them for consultation, they might end up reunited after all.</p><p>(Follows the Silence of the Lambs plot)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Brunello

**Author's Note:**

> Love the idea of Hannibal/Silence cross-overs, so here's my go at it!  
> Read & review if you like. Beta: the lovely kaysaravia1  
> (Rated M for some language)

**EXCLUSIVE INSIDER STORY: MURDER HUSBANDS CAUGHT IN PARIS**

_By Freddie Lounds, Tattle Crime_

_Updated 7:48 AM (ET,) Mon October 15, 2025_

**PARIS, FRANCE—** The end of a nearly ten year manhunt unfolded last Thursday night on the streets of the Invalides District.

        Dr. Hannibal “The Cannibal” Lecter and his partner, ex-FBI agent and profiler, Will Graham were subdued by Parisian police officers after being tipped off by an unlikely source: a 22-year old college student from the Paris Institute of Criminology.

        “We were entering the bio-psychological analysis course of our semester,” the student, who does not wish not be named, told _Tattle Crime_ in an exclusive interview. “We spent a good portion of it on examining different cases involving serial killings so I knew [Dr. Lecter’s] face very well by the first week of studies.”

        The student first spotted Lecter at the Marché de St-Honoré market place in August. “I had to stop and look again, but it was definitely him.” The student immediately informed police officials who conveyed the information to the French National Police.

        Bother Lecter and Graham were presumed dead back in 2015, disappearing after the murder of the “Tooth Fairy” Francis Dolarhyde <>pictured on right<> at one of Lecter’s homes in Maryland. However, many believed that the pair was still on the run, such as Inspector General Deniel Lamar, one of the main investigators involved in the arrests. “I watched and read about [Lecter and Graham] back when it was all going on in the States,” stated Lamar at a post-hearing Sunday morning. “I always thought that their “deaths” were a little too convenient.”

        When given the student’s statement, Lamar’s reaction was one of disbelief. “I said, “You’re kidding me?”” Lamar laughed, “But then we got our best men on the job. We knew we had to take action soon or we would lose this time we had been given.”

        Lamar led a month long investigation, gathering information about Lecter and Graham. What they discovered was nothing less than shocking. Both men had been living nearly ten years under the aliases of Dr. Roman and Matthew Fell and had become a prominent couple within their community neighbors would later say. They were also connected to over 28 disappearances and murders that had occurred in the area, though officials believe the number maybe even higher.

        On the evening of October 11th, Lamar, flanked by more than a dozen law-enforcement officers, finally set their trap. They set up barracks along the location of Lecter and Graham’s home on Rue di Colonel Combes, cleared a fifteen block perimeter, and cautioned the community that the men should be considered extremely dangerous. All officers at the scene were instructed to shoot to disable if either Lecter or Graham was spotted, shoot to kill if they appeared hostile.

        At 11:32 AM (CET,) police converged on the Lecter-Graham home. The home was broken into using the front and back door. Racing upstairs, Lamar stated that the apartment was completely black and almost deathly quiet, “I felt so uneasy going in there,” he said when recounting the arrests. “We got to the first story and then went even further, to the second.”

        There, officers apprehended Lecter who complied with the arrest and surrendered. Unfortunately, Graham had evaded the officers by using a back balcony and continued to lead them in an almost two hour long manhunt.

        Officers followed Graham from the adjacent street on Ru de Bac all the way to Boulevard Saint-Germain before losing him in a construction zone. The intense manhunt, that included more than 200 officers, finally came to an end when officers surrounded Graham on his way to the Vanves – Malakoff train station.

        “I think the arrests were a significant success,” Lamar would later say. “I'm just glad that it went so smoothly.”

        Lecter and Graham were taken to the Maison d'arrêt de la Santé prison and put in separate cells. One guards there described the two as “angered, irrational, almost feral” when they were separated into different holding cells.

        As of this morning, it was announced that the two would be separated even further: Lecter will be sent to the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane while Graham will be placed in Reading Psychiatric Institute in Pennsylvania.

        After nearly a decade of avoiding the police, living false lives, and silently terrorizing the public, Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham are finally paying for their crimes. We at _Tattle Crime_ would love to recognize the bravery and ingenuity of the officers who decided to bring these monsters to an end. I know this journalist will sleep a little easier tonight.

        Dr. Frederick Chilton, hospital head of the facility Lecter will be returning to at the end of this week, talked to the Baltimore Sun over his feelings about the incident: “The honeymoon is over. Dr. Lecter and Will Graham are finally behind bars, exactly where they belong. Welcome home, boys.”

<><><>

_Feb, 2030—_

        Jack Crawford sat with his legs stretched out, head rested against the back of his chair, and an empty and waiting glass in his hand. His knees still flared from the stairs he had to tackle on his way into the home he now sat in. Nowadays, it was an endeavor to even get the mail without having to stop and massage the pain out of his joints.

        I'm old, Jack thought drolly as he sipped at his drink. The thought always made him pause, confused, until he remembered the twenty years of retirement that slipped through his fingers ; twenty years of prescribed medication, solitary walks through the woods around his house, and waking up every morning to find that it took him _just_ a bit longer to get out of bed than it was the day before. It all felt forged to him, though. He wasn’t truly retired. In fact, he never did. The Bureau had made sure of that.

        “You’re a valuable asset to us, Jack,” Director Hayden Burke once told him. It had been his polite way of saying “We’ll never give you a break.” And Jack was more or less fine with that. He loved to keep busy, loved to be of service. But he had grown tired and as his 70th birthday slowly edged closer, all he wanted was to be left alone.

        However, that didn’t seem to matter to Calvin Sesske, the spry new BHU Agent-in-charge at the FBI in Quantico.

        Jack had met him once at a fundraiser for some lucrative thing, sponsored by some even more lucrative department. He had been the “guest of honor” and Sesske had just been sworn into the job he had held so many years ago. They had hit it off, but there was no spark, no connection. In Jack’s mind, Sesske was a casual acquaintance, yet their relationship (if you would call it that) seemed to be one of Sesske’s top priorities.

        He would call Jack in as a consult, from time to time, or invite him to faculty events. Lately, the younger man had taken to clearing up nights in his schedule for reasons solely to have half-an-hour discussions with Jack at his office or his brownstone on Mullen Avenue. Jack didn’t wholeheartedly mind the nagging or the impromptu requests for a visit (he like the company and the free drinks) but Sesske was becoming harder to take. As his energy was abundant and thriving, Jack’s just wasn’t up to task anymore.

        Behind him, Jack heard the door to the den he sat in opened. Sesske bounced in, hands cradling a lavish looking bottle of single grain whiskey. He smiled as he took a seat opposite of Jack. “He’s that Greenore I was telling you about.” He gestured the bottle towards Jack with an air of satisfaction.

        “It sure is,” Jack laughed and took the bottle from Sesske’s hand. Jack twisted the cap off the bottle and added it to his glass.

        “This is why I love having you over, Jack. You have excellent taste,” Sesske laughed. He sat on the edge of his chair and straightened his back so that his shadow covered Jack’s own. Sesske was a smaller man, yet managed to find ways to appear larger. Jack once saw him arranging slats under his office desk to make the whole thing higher so when sat on a person would feel a good two feet taller. The alpha dog approach didn’t attract Jack anymore. He was too old to try and act the boss and found it much more interesting to watch hot shots like Sesske make an attempt to prove themselves...

        They drank in silence and sat comfortably in the warm glow of a lit fireplace. Jack glanced at the wall of books to his side (a collection, unfortunately, dotted with books by a certain Ms. Lounds and Dr. Chilton…) and rolled his shoulders. At this point of night, he would normally watch the clock, waiting for the time when he got to say, “Next time.” shake hands with the other man, then leave.

        But this night, Sesske did something new: he cleared his throat, sat down his glass, and shot Jack a rehearsed smile. “Do you mind if we talk about something a little personal, Jack?”

        Jack felt his brow furrow. “Uh…” he shook his head and held his glass with both hands, “Sure.”

        At this, Sesske beamed and fixed himself higher in his seat. He paused, ran his tongue over his teeth, and laced his fingers together. “May we talk about Dr. Lecter?”

        Something solid fisted itself in Jack’s throat, making him swallow stiffly. “Hannibal Lecter?” His voice sounded strangled. He loosened the knot of his tie with shaky hands. His fingers skim across the faded scar along the side of his neck (it throbbed under his touch.) He watched Sesske nod his head enthusiastically. “Why?”

        Sesske took a breath. “You’ve heard about this guy, Buffalo Bill?” Jack nodded. “Talk of the town, all over the news, right? Well, we’ve been on this case for months and haven’t gotten a lick.”

        An implacable sense of dread filled Jack’s stomach, making the alcohol slogging there rise till he could taste it on the back of his tongue.

        “We’ve been thinking of taking some consulting on and this particular type of case would need, well, a particular type of consultant,” Sesske said.

        A lengthy pause. “What does this have to do with Lecter?”

        “After some thinking, we’ve agreed that he would be our best bet.” Another, lengthier, pause. “What do you think, Jack?”

        Passed the roaring in his ears, Jack could hear the clock hanging on the adjacent wall hit midnight. A sheen of sweat had built up over his forehead and scalp, dripping lines under the collar of his suit and sliding down his back.

        “Jack?”

        Without hesitation, Jack finally speaks: “I think you’re a fucking idiot.”

        Sesske’s smile drops almost comically fast. He frowns and raises his hand, “Hey now—”

        “No!” Jack’s voice rattles the room and lowers Sesske a few inches into his seat. “Listen to me Calvin, Hannibal Lecter is locked away. He’s gone! Do not change that.”

        The look of surprise and hurt on Sesske’s face dissolves into a hard glare. “We’re not setting him free, Jack. He’ll be acting as a consultant. Nothing like any of your stunts will happen on my dime.” Sesske’s comment digs into Jack’s chest; pointing out other’s mistakes is yet another way Sesske makes up for is height.

        Jack shakes his head. “You don’t know Lecter like I do, Calvin. Just interacting with him will lead to trouble.” Sesske opens his mouth, but Jack cuts his hand through the air. “I'm telling you to find someone else. There are dozens of profilers working for the bureau, use one of them.”

        Sesske grabs his fingers into his chest. “You don’t think I have? They got nothing— _we’ve_ got nothing on the guy, Jack!” By the time he stops to take a breath, Sesske’s face is turning red. “We need help and we need it now.”

        There’s a heavy, strained silence before Sesske rakes a hand through his haphazardly combed hair. “Lecter is our best bet and we are going to use him. I just thought you should know.”

        Jack stares down at the glass clutched in his hand. “You’re making a mistake.”

        Sesske gives a long-suffering sigh and stands. He hikes his waistband higher up on his hips then runs his thumbs under his nose with a sniff. “It won’t be if we get this guy caught.”

        Jack shakes his head over and over again. His heat raced against his chest (frighteningly so, at his age.) “Are you…Will Graham?”

        “Won’t mess with him,” Sesske said, the color in his cheeks dying down. “To much risk mixing with both of them. And Graham’s too unstable. I heard he disfigured an attendant over at Reading just last week.”

        Hearing this added weight to Jack’s shoulders.

        Once they finished their drinks, Sesske escorted Jack out. He waved as Jack clamored into his car (accompanied with an awkward “Goodbye.” and “Drive safe.” and the ever popular “Next time…”) then slipped back behind the dark door of his house.

        Jack sat in his car with his coat pulled tightly around him and his hat sitting precariously on his head. His heart was hammering in his chest, cutting his breathing short, making him pant. Puffs of heated breath filled the frigid interior of the car. Outside, the February chill was setting in on the trees that lined the street, making their limbs creak and bend. Jack could feel it, the same looming presence he had felt so many years ago (back when the world was full of dragons and men who would run away to slay them together.)

        Wiping the sweat from his face, Jack swallowed and fumbled his phone out of his coat pocket. He scrolled through his contacts and hit CALL. The line rung twice then clicked. “Alana?” Jack said. “Something’s going to happen.”


	2. Valpolicella

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Both men had, Clarice noted, the same eyes: intense, all-knowing, and completely black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who comment and/or left kudos on the first chapter! You're all wonderful!  
> Here's chapter 2, kinda short, mostly filler~ Read & review if you like.
> 
> Beta: the amazing kaysaravia1

        Clarice Starling adjusted her footing, hearing the squeak of her tennis shoes against the concrete floor. In her hands her pistol sat, ready and waiting ( _never cock, just squeeze_.) Surrounding her sides were a group of officers, all covered in the same Kevlar vests and padded cargo pants as she was; all packed into a dingy hallway, crowding the door they were about to break through.

        They all breathed together—in, out, in, out, in—

        The lead officer holding the front kicked his foot into the middle of a door, flinging it open with a loud crash. They moved into the room, spilling out into the darkened bedroom there. Clarice examined the room: a woman sat on a bed near the far wall, gagged shoved deep in her mouth (muffled scream,) tears running down her face. Close by, a man stood, gun in hand.

        “Freeze! FBI!” Clarice shouted and dropped into a crouch.

        The man moved back as the other officers circled around him. He raised his hands in the air, giving Clarice a good view of the duct tape that secured the gun to his hand. With a jolt, she turned just as the woman on the bed pulled a gun out from under her thigh.

        “Gun!” Clarice rushed the woman, knocking the gun from her hand and throwing both back onto the bed. The woman hissed and flung her arms wildly. Clarice pressed her weight _down_ on top of the other body, synching her leg up and slamming a knee into the woman’s stomach.

        More scrambling, kicking, snarling, but Clarice kept the woman pinned, elbows digging into the woman’s shoulders. In her ears, Clarice could hear her heartbeat. It pounded, beat after beat, steady (always steady.) She stared down at the woman restrained under her. She was smiling.

        An echoing whistle sounded throughout the room and lights snapped on, flooding Clarice’s vision with light. The woman sat up and gave her a small shove. “Nice one, Starling. Now get off.”

        Clarice smiled bashfully and climbed off the bed. Around her, the other officers were undoing the clasps of their vests and talking quietly; one shouted to another and they were thrown a water bottle, which he preceded to dump over his head. The man with his hand still taped walked over to the woman Clarice had just been struggling with, and gave her a pat on the back.

        With the lights on, Clarice could see how empty and manufactured, just like every other simulation room they had practiced storming. Still doesn’t take from the thrill, she thought.

        When she had joined the Academy, Clarice had been told to drop. “It’s tough,” one woman at the main desk said. “And some people just aren’t cut out for it.”

        “I'm not one of them,” was Clarice’s response. And she wasn’t. Six months in, and she was the top of her class, in the best shape of her life, and very, very close to getting a badge (no one would call her “Agent.” as a jest after that.)

        The doorway, a voice yelled “Good exercise, people.” followed by her CO. He walked in, chest stuck out, and scanned the room with narrowed eyes. “Starling,” Clarice stood straighter, “your reaction time was excellent. Everyone else...you could do better.” A resounding groan filled the room. The CO shook his head and gestured for everyone to file out.

        “Not you Starling,” he said, catching Clarice’s shoulder as she passed through the doorway. “Sesske would like to see you.”

        “Mr. Sesske?” Clarice tugged her vest off over her head. “Have…I done something, sir?”

        The CO sniffed and took the vest out of Clarice’s hand. “Don’t think so. Now go. He’s just leaving his office.”

        Clarice gave a little nod and a “Yes, sir.” before jogging down the hallway.

        Walking up to the FBI Academy central office, Clarice stopped on the front steps and ran her fingers through her hair. She had never spoken to Sesske, let alone been called on before, and it made her stomach tighten to think that her first meeting with the Agent-in-Charge would consist of her in her training sweats, hair amess, and back covered in sweat. She fidgeted with her hairband before finally ripping it off, letting her short hair fall limply around her face.

        “Starling!”

        Clarice jumped and whirled around. Five steps up, Agent Sesske was watching her with an amused smirk. “Mr. Sesske,” Clarice laughed and began climbing the stairs. “Good morning.”

        Sesske put a hand out. “No need. I'm heading to my car. Follow.”

        His coat billowed behind him as he moved passed Clarice, its edges hitting the sides of her legs. She followed after, keeping _just_ behind. She had learned through whispers and sniggers of the man’s almost deadly Napoleon complex, and seeing how just in her trainers Clarice still had a good two inches on him, she kept back.

        “Mr. Brigham told me that you wanted to speak with me, sir?” she said as they entered the parking lot behind the Academy.

        “Yes,” Sesske nodded and stopped abruptly in front of a black BMW. He fished in his pockets before pulling out a key. He pressed a button and the car unlocked. Swinging the driver’s door open, Sesske tossed his briefcase into the passenger’s seat. “I'm told you’re the top of your class, Starling.”

        The February air gusted at her exposed face, turning her nose and cheeks an unpleasant color of red. She sniffed then smiled timidly. “I hope so, sir. I haven’t seen any scores yet.”

        Sesske hummed, his dark hair whipping around in the upset wind. He wrapped his scarf tighter around his neck. “We have a job that just came up and I thought of you.”

        “Me, sir?”

        “Yes. We’re getting a psychobehavioral profile from a consultant down at the state asylum. Over the Buffalo Bill case.” Sesske shot Clarice a look.

        Clarice blinked then nodded. “The man killing all those poor women, yes sir, I know him.”

        “Good,” Sesske clapped his gloved hands before sliding into his car. “Very good. I’d like you to go down to the asylum and talk to our guy. See if you can get him to cooperate.” He paused, then, begrudgingly, “We need him Starling. He could close this case for us.”

        Clarice took a step back when Sesske shut his car door and started the engine. The car screeched then stilled and rumbled softly. “Who’s the subject?” she asked, leaning slightly towards the car.

        Sesske pitched his voice over the sound of the car: “A psychiatrist. Maybe you’ve heard of him—Dr. Hannibal Lecter?”

        Clarice’s skin grew cold (colder.) Her mouth hung open before she can stop it. “The cannibal…” Sesske stares unblinkingly at her, a cautionary look on his face. Clarice felt heat spread across her face. “I mean thank you, sir. For the opportunity. Um…but why me.”

        Sesske’s car gives another jilted sound. “You have the qualifications and, more to the point, you’re available,” he finally says. “And I'm not wasting real agents of this.” Before Clarice can speak, he shoves a thick manila folder through the side window. (Clarice barely catches it before it hits the ground.) “Everything you need is in there; copy of our questionnaire, file on Lecter, file of the case, a special ID for you—”

        Clarice opened the folder and stared down at a small picture of herself scanned onto a placard. She picked it up then stilled. Underneath the placard were two 5’’x7’’ pictures. One was of a cleaned shaven man with thin lips and a sharp face framed by short, greying hair—the other of a younger, scruffy faced man with a jagged scar across his right cheek and brown curls that draped over his brow.

        Both men had, Clarice noted, the same eyes: intense, all-knowing, and completely black.

        Sesske caught her staring. “You won’t have to worry about Graham,” he said, reaching out of his car and tapping the photo of the younger man. “He’s not a part of this.” Sesske paused to strap himself in. “The director will want a copy of your report, if I think it’s good enough to send over. Remember, Starling, this is your deal. No one needs to know about it. We don’t need this getting out to the papers. That was Jack Crawford’s thing. Dr. Chilton, the place’s head, will get you to Lecter. Other than that,” he paused, “just don’t get too close.”

        Clarice shut the casefile and held it to her chest as Sesske pulled forward and looped the parking lot. She watched him as he rolled to a stop at the exiting ramp then sticks his head out his window. “Get Lecter to look at the questionnaire, and only the questionnaire. You don’t want this guy snooping inside your head. And Starling,” he called, “try not to stare.”

        "Oh, yes sir," Clarice nodded. "I've taken the 'Visiting Etiquette' course.”

        Passed the car's engine, Sesske gave a small laugh. He dabbed a gloved hand across the curve of his forehead and sniffed. "I'm not talking about the inmates."

        And with that, he sped away, leaving Clarice shivering in the cold.


	3. Aligoté

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “In fact, I believe I am the only god Hannibal Lecter still knows.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo, chapter 3! A big thank you to everyone who commented and/or left a kudos so far.  
> Beta: the incredible kaysaravia1

        After nearly 2 hours on the road, Clarice’s car finally rolled into the snowy drive of the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. The institute was grand, with sharp and curved edges and a jutting tower.

        Barred windows covered almost every spot on the outside walls. Four columns stood erect in front of the buildings main doors. A somewhat modest (but none the less pristine) landscape was hidden by layer after layer of snow, making the trees and bushes look drooped and dead.

        Waiting on the porch, bundled up in a downy coat, was a big man in scrub bottoms and walking shoes. He waved at Clarice as she exited her car. “Ms. Starling,” the man called. He stuck out a large hand when Clarice got to the hospital’s steps. “My name is Barney. I’ll be escortin’ you today.”

        Clarice smiled and shook Barney’s hand. “It’s officer.” She looked around the building. “Nice to meet you, but I was—expecting Dr. Chilton.”

        “Officer then.” Barney nodded his head, breathing deeply through his nose, and opened the front doors behind him. He ushered them inside. “Dr. Chilton doesn’t really go outside much. He’s waitin’ in his office, though.”

        At that moment a whirring sound caught Clarice’s ear. She stopped and looked up at the small black orb drilled into the ceiling. Craning her neck, Clarice counted over 15 just in the main room alone. “You have a vast security system here, I take it.”

        “Oh yeah,” Barney said as he lumbered ahead of her. “Dr. Chilton likes to keep his eyes on everythin’. There are even cameras in the bathrooms.” Clarice slowed to a stop and frowned. Barney gave a strong laugh, “Oh, not the public ones. Just for the inmates.”

        “I see,” Clarice coughed and hiked her purse further onto her shoulder. “And where exactly are the inmates?”

        “Well, the hospital’s in layers, you see. The first layer, the one we’re on, is for the staff and nurses and the doctor. We also got conference rooms and offices, kitchens and med wards here.” Barney held a glass partition opened and Clarice hurried through, entering a high-ceilinged room with two staircases and a spacious sitting area. Barney continued, pointing upwards. “Upstairs, on the next layer, that’s where all the crazies are. Above that, is where the crazier crazies are.” Barney paused in front of a lavish wooden door (the minimalistic plague on the door, decorated with elaborate etching, read _Frederick Chilton, Ph.D._ )

        Barney chuckled, “And way down passed the basement, well, that’s where Dr. Lecter’s kind is.”

        Clarice frowned and quietly watched Barney knock on the door. He pushed it opened with a grunt and stuck his head in. “Dr. Chilton, _Officer_ Starling is here.” Clarice moved back and smiled as Barney squeezed passed her, tipping his hat as he went, before disappearing upstairs.

        “Officer Starling.”

        From inside the office came an off key voice. Clutching her purse, Clarice slowly walked all the way into the room, shutting the door behind her. The office was large with high reaching windows and an entire wall packed with an arrangement of books. Brass finishes and leather upholstery dominated the space. Everything was polished and clean, almost sterile, making Clarice feel significantly out of place.

        In the middle of the room was a sleek desk, topped with an equally sleek looking computer, more books, and a small lamp. Sitting behind it was Dr. Chilton, dressed in an impeccable suit and tie.

        The first thing Clarice noticed about the man was the slight discoloration of his lips—they had a synthetic sheen to them, like the resuscitation dummies they used back at the academy. The next thing was his skin. ( _Patchwork_ drifted through Clarice’s head.) Tanned, pale, and pink skin melded together over the man’s face. White vein like lines spread from the corner of his left eye all the way down the side of his jaw. Above his glassy eyes, a pair of false eyebrows sat, shockingly dark compared to the fair skinned forehead. His hair was the same: black, sculpted, fake.

        Clarice examined all of this before balking, Sesske’s earlier words replaying in her head, shame lighting up her cheeks. “It’s—very nice to meet you, Dr. Chilton,” she stammered, dropping her eyes to the floor.

        Across the room, Chilton tittered. “It’s perfectly alright to stare, Officer Starling.”

        Clarice shook her head (he cheeks ached.) “No—No. I'm sorry, I wasn’t…”

        Chilton held up a hand. “Officer Starling, please. I'm aware that my appearance is off-putting. It’s, truly, no offense to me if you take a look.” He paused, leaned back in his chair, and pointed a finger towards himself. “Took over 100 epidermal autografts and a terrific plastic surgeon to get me presentable again.”

        Clarice eyes widened as she smiled. “That’s amazing.”

Chilton nodded absently then looked towards his computer. He tilted the screen to the side. “Come over here, Officer Starling. I have something to show you. Yes, just over here.”

        Moving from her spot near the door, Clarice walked around the desk and stopped just behind Chilton’s shoulder. The close, she could smell the rich scents of his cologne and aftershave. It was pleasant, expensive (and strange. Clarice had expected to smell smoke…)

        On the computer screen were six squares, each holding a different view of the hospital. All the feeds were crystal clear, dated and timed. Occasionally, the feeds would change, and soon six new recordings were playing before Clarice’s eyes. Chilton tipped his head back and looked at Clarice somewhat smugly. “We have over 40 patients here. All are under my care and most importantly, my watch. I see everything. Always.”

        Clarice stared at the screen for a moment more. “Very impressive.”

        Chilton gave a hum. He tapped something onto the keyboard that sat on a pullout tray under the lip of his desk. The six squares on the screen split giving way to a single feed. On display was an aerial shot of a cell, consisting of four walls (three of brick, one lined with bars,) a toilet, a small table cluttered with papers and blunted pencils, and a bed: in it, a man in a monochromatic jumpsuit laid flat on his back. Chilton tapped the keys again. The feed zoomed in on the cell’s inhabitant, focusing till Clarice could make out the smallest details of the man’s slightly aged face.

        “There he is,” Chilton whispered. “Baltimore State’s finest.”

        It took Clarice a moment to realize who she was looking at. It was indeed Dr. Lecter (his name was typed out under the feed,) yet it…wasn’t at the same time. This man was quietly resting with his hands folded across his stomach, eyes shut. He looked peaceful, tamed.

        “Do you want to know something interesting?” Chilton asked her. “I keep him in the exact cell Will Graham sat in so long ago.”

        Clarice smiled timidly as Chilton gave a laugh. His faux skin stretched awkwardly, white capped teeth flashing. The sound was a bizarre thing is Clarice’s ears. “I like to remind him of that sometimes,” he said with a breath. “He gets so riled up whenever someone mentions that name. It’s great entertainment.”

        A fierce face was projected onto the back of Clarice’s skull. No one talked about Will Graham, other than the offhanded comments about his days at the FBI ( _“He was one of us, and then he cracked.”…“He was the best out on the field, and then Lecter got ahold of him.”…“He was already too close, and then, and then, and then—_ ) and the only mention Sesske had made of him when he put her on the case was one of dismissal.

        There wasn’t even a dossier about him in her casefile. Simply a photo. “Dr. Lecter and Mr. Graham were close, I figure?”

        An exasperated sigh escaped Chilton’s lips followed by a roll of the eyes. “Oh, yes. The whole thing is rather soppy. Torrid romance, unresolved tensions, that sort of thing.” He flicked his hand through the air. “Nauseous, I know, but Will Graham is miles away, locked up in his own special little box. Hardly of importance as far as I'm concerned.”

       Clarice nodded then walked back around the desk. She stood behind one of the red leather chairs set up. “Well, um, I was told that there would be safety procedures to go over.”

        At this, Chilton nodded. “Yes, yes. Due to the nature of some of the patients, Dr. Lecter included, there are basic rules for any visitor to follow:

        “Remain five feet away from the bars at all times. Try to refrain from interacting with any of the other patients you might encounter; they get restless when a new face comes to visit. Of course, you will not be allowed to carry any sort of…destructive items on your persons. Knives, pens, your gun especially, anything that could cause a person to possibly die.” He shook his head gravely. “We would hate for anything nasty to happen. But don’t worry, Officer Starling. I will be monitoring everything.”

        “Ah,” Clarice took a moment to remove her issued pistol from its holster on her hip. She turned it, handle forward, and placed it gingerly on the top of Chilton’s desk. “You’re not…accompanying me?”

        She watched as Chilton reached out a thin hand and dragged the gun closer. He slid opened a drawer, guided the gun inside, then shut it loudly. He finally chuckled, “Oh no, no. In the five years that he has been here, not once have I been even ten feet from Hannibal Lecter.” He shifted in his chair, its sleek leather squeaking. “I'm much more comfortable here.”

        Chilton placed his elbows on the edge of his desk and tucked his hands under his chin. “You see, there is something euphoric about watching a man like Hannibal Lecter rot in a cell. You start to feel like God.” A pause. “In fact, I believe I am the only god Hannibal Lecter still knows.”

        Clarice dipped her head. “It’s always good to have a higher power to look up to, I suppose.”

        Something (dark) scurried across Chilton’s eyes, making them shine. He kept them on her as he jabbed a thumb on the keyboard. There was a beep. “Barney,” he said to the air, “will you take Officer Starling down now?”

        Seconds later, Barney entered the room.

        Clarice gave him a glance before Chilton called back her attention. “I'm sorry to say that you’ll only have an hour or so to conduct your questions. Lights go out at 7 sharp, I'm afraid.”

        “Thank you, doctor.”

        Another hum, another scurry across the eyes. Plastic lips smiled at her. “Good luck, Officer Starling. Truly,” Chilton said. He turned back to his computer (she was dismissed) to watch his feeds, Lecter's pixelated face still there on the screen.

        Barney held the door for her as she ducked out of the room. He led them back to the front door of the hospital. This time, they took to the left side of the entranceway. Hidden behind decorative molds that made its doors blend in with the wall, was an elevator. “In you go,” Barney said.

        Clarice boarded the elevator and waited for Barney to clamor on. She watched him slide the doors shut and press the button labeled _B2_. The lift gave a hiss, then a shudder, then began to drop.


	4. Zinfandel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “The act of rebirth,” there was a laugh trailing Bedelia’s voice. “Which side were you born on this time, Will?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Time for a flashback! I thought of everything being in black and white while writing this. Mood setter for sure~ Also, this chapter made me really hungry...don't know if that's bad or not *sweats*
> 
> Thank you a thousand times over to all of you darlings who commented and/or left a kudos!
> 
> Beta: the tremendous kaysaravia1

_Nov, 2015_ —

        The scents of garlic, rosemary, and oil wafted passed Hannibal, gathering heavily in his nose and layering on his tongue. Heat from the oven swirled around the kitchen, simmering over his face; a delightfully flush covered his cheeks and neck. Hannibal sighed.

        On the digital timer, numbers slowly flashed in a countdown ( _:10—:09—:08—_ ) Slipping his hand into an oven mitt, Hannibal gripped the oven’s handle with his free hand and waited for the beep. From the tinted screen, he could see the charring flesh of meat and the dripping lines of sauce. His mouth watered.

        The timer beeped (once only) and Hannibal jerked the door open with a flourish. A ball of heat and smells hit his face, blowing the hair off his forehead. Grabbing the rim of the baking pan, he slid the meal out of its home and onto the kitchen island behind him. He shut and clicked off the oven, ended the timer, and turned to examine his dish.

        A golden glow had taken over the meat’s skin and small bubbles of heated fat dotted it. The added spices had cooked seamlessly and its grease had poured into the basin of the pan. Nodding, Hannibal adjusted a cutting board over to the side of the pan. Picking up a skewering rod, he carefully punctured the meat, sliding it just over the bone. Steam from the meat’s cooked insides hissed out and a squelching sound came when the rod pressed all the way through.

        Carefully, Hannibal braced the meat with one hand and lifted the skewer with another. He held the slab of meat a few inches into the air while he removed the draining level from the pan. He lowered the meat back in, letting the grease and sauce that had collected slosh around, washing over it.

        He touched the end of his pinky to the well-cooked skin, brought it to his tongue, and let the flavor bloomed inside his mouth (rich, oaky, savory.) Moving the pan to the center of the island, he placed an already adorned platter next to it. Bright, freshly cut fruits and citruses sat around the edge of the platter joined with a scattering of purple roses. In the middle, eight unfolded banana leaves lay, their green color none the less bright under the weak kitchen fluorescents.

        Hannibal let the pan juices soak more into the meat before he gripped the end of the skewer still lodged in it. With his other hand he picked up a pair of tongs, clicking the metal arms together. Meticulously, he moved the meat from the pan to the platter, gently placing it on top of the banana leaves.

        Steam spread across the platter, fogging it, making the leaves curl slightly. Hannibal slid the skewer back out (shuddering at the delicious pop it made when it was pulled from the suction of the meat.) He moved to the side so that he faced the dish head on. With both hands, he grabbed the ends of the first banana leaf and pulled it upwards. Twisting the ends, Hannibal tightened the leaf into a knot, wrapped around the meat snuggly. He did this for the next seven (twist, knot, twist, knot—) till each leaf was tied and set.

        Hannibal stepped away and lifted his apron over his head, folding it on the back of one of the bar stools that stood near the island. He straightened one of the roses before finally letting his shoulders relax and his lips curve.

        “Finito.”

        He left the kitchen through the tall swinging door, platter in hand, and entered the dining room. A large, stained oak table sat in the middle of the room. Its shape seemed to absorb the timid light of the hanging chandelier. There were three places set (three plates, three glasses, three sets of silverware.)

        One of the spots was already filled.

        Bedelia Du Maurier sat with her head lolled back and her eyes shut. The dress Hannibal had garbed her in, with its plunging neckline and slimming cut, moved with her as she breathed (shallow ins and outs.) Her styled hair flowed around her pale and shadowed face.

        “Bedelia,” Hannibal whispered as he placed the dish in the center of the table. Steam wafted from it, swirling in the air, vanishing. Hannibal moved to the head of the table and let a hand brush against Bedelia’s cheek. “It’s time to wake up.”

        It had been almost insultingly easy to break into the doctor’s home. The back door’s decorative glass panel broke submissively under Hannibal’s hand. No alarms had sounded when he and Will crossed the threshold of the house. In his head, Hannibal had scolded Bedelia for being so sloppy (so senseless as to think she had seen the last of them.)

        And of course she had to be his and Will’s first stop (there was no disputing it.)

        After a good two months of recovering—a month before their scares set in and their bodies relaxed and the smell of the ocean finally left their noses, another for the papers and the tabloids to lose interest and move their names off the front page—Hannibal began arrangements for them to move, quickly.

        “Where to next?” Will had asked when they slinked away from the cabin they had played prisoners to.

        “I have funds waiting for us in Europe. From there, anywhere to your liking.”

        Will had met Hannibal’s gaze. “I wasn’t talking about our next hideaway.”

        Hannibal smiled: “A dinner with Dr. Du Maurier would be ideal.”

        They boarded a train not long after. They took no luggage (he’d buy them new, more tasteful belongings once they had settled down) and sat in the very back of a midnight express to Baltimore. At some point, Will had slumped against the window and slept. In his unconsciousness, his eyes fluttered and the line of his neck pulsed.

        Hannibal watched him and when the train rocked on its tracks, jerking Will awake, he’d slid a heavy hand on the other man’s knee. They’d shared a look before Will returned to sleep, Hannibal’s hand remaining.

        When they reached Baltimore, Hannibal picked them out a car from the station’s parking lot. He hadn’t hesitated wrapping his fist in his jacket and smashing it through the driver’s side window. Unlocking the doors, both he and Will slipped into the front seats. He hotwired the vehicle and had them on the road in a matter of minutes.

        Will had watched him the entire time.

        Hannibal sent the stolen car rolling into a dark ditch near the road when they reached Bedelia’s property. He led them up and over the small wall encircling the back lawn and crept along the stone patio. Once in, he had found Bedelia’s hoard of medication: pharmaceuticals, recreational, analgesics, antidepressants; the same pickings she had during their gallivanting in Florence. Hannibal sorted through the selections as Will hung back, watching yet again (still distant, still the onlooker, still trapped in the ocean.)

        He’d finally found what he was looking for (ketamine) in a drawer in the fridge and when he entered her room and injected the drug into her system, the most Bedelia did was twitch.

        “Bedelia,” Hannibal said again, this time patting the sides of the older woman’s face.

        Bedelia gave a waking intake of breath and slowly let her cloudy eyes open. They glanced around before freezing. “Wha—”A string of drowsy words spilled from her mouth before her head collapsed onto her chest, the tranquilizer in her system still weighing her body down.

        “Now, now. We need to stay awake, dinner is ready,” Hannibal _tsk_ ed. He snapped Bedelia’s head up off her chest and held it firmly forward. “You wouldn’t want to miss it would you? I guarantee I cooked it with care.” He smiled as a glint finally formed in Bedelia’s eyes. He reached a hand down and stroked it along her bandaged thigh that hid near the slit of her dress.

        Bedelia’s shot her leg a look, then the dish on the table, and blanched. After a moment, she swallowed and shut her eyes tightly. “I'm sure you have.”

        Hannibal gave the skin under his hand a squeeze and leaned forward so that his face was inches from Bedelia’s. “Let’s fetch your other guest, shall we?” He sniffed at her neck, making her recoil sharply in her seat, chest heaving.

        As expected, Will had declined his offer to work with him in the kitchen ( _“I’ll pass.”_ ) and had stayed in the master bedroom upstairs. Hannibal knew that it would take some time for them to become accustomed to their new lives (in all ways, not just with their natures, but with their company. Their bodies.) He would not rush it. If anything, he’d always had an abundance of patience.

        He entered the bedroom without knocking only to find Will waiting, facing the door from his seat on the large bed. Hannibal smiled and shut the door behind him. “Dinner’s ready.”

        Will lifted his head slightly and flared his nostrils. “I can smell it.”

        Hannibal hummed and walked over to the room’s adjoined bathroom. He felt Will’s eyes peer at the center of his back, watching him intently. He opened the bathroom door and reached around the side of the frame, flipping on the lights.

        The room was lavish and clean, covered in white tile and porcelain. A large mirror hung over the single sink and a claw-foot tub sat on the left side of the room. Along the wall near the toilet was a large walk-in closet. Hannibal opened it and peered into the elongated space. In the far back, a small collection of his suits still hung, left from when he had roomed in the Du Maurier household so long ago. (He scolded Bedelia again for still clinging to something left in the past.)

        Hannibal selected one for himself—a cream colored three piece suit with a pinstriped vest, ebony tie, and a black and white lined pocket square—then took a rather lengthy time picking one out for Will. After picturing every combination of outfit on Will’s body (imagining the way the clothes would fit him; the way the fabrics would wrap somewhat loose around his shoulders and thighs) he decided on a simple white button down shirt and black slacks. Casual, yet eloquent, just like Will.

        He changed in the bathroom, taking a moment to pick at the edges of the bandage that wrapped around his middle; unraveling it, peeling it, removing it. Now, his gunshot wound was a mere indent of the skin. Hannibal skimmed his thumb along the scar before stepping into his suit.

        A sigh escaped him as the feeling of cashmere and wool slid against his skin—at how the lines of the suit molded perfectly with every line of his body. In the mirror, Hannibal saw himself again. It was a homecoming; wearing t-shirts, sweaters, and jeans for weeks on end had been tasking, yet this reward had been worth the wait.

        He brushed down a line in his jacket (everything straightening, everything perfect) before walking back into the bedroom. He registered the look Will gave him with a smirk and laid the clothes out across the end of the bed.

        Will frowned and shifted in his spot. “How many suits do you own?”

        Hannibal chuckled and straightened his cuff. “Undress, Will.”

        There was a pause where Will’s brow furrowed and his back tensed, but he did what he was told. Timidly, he slipped his shirt over his head and held it in his hands. Hannibal could see the last signs of the bruises along Will’s chest and stomach, their colors barely visible. He’d healed up well, even the more severe wound on his chest was nothing more than a design on his skin now— _his_ design ( _their design._ )

        “Don’t stare at me,” Will said, frowning as he stood, his fingers on the button of his pants.

        “Of course,” Hannibal nodded and turned around (always patient.) He listened to the slide of Will’s zipper and the rustle of skin against denim.

        After a moment, Will cleared his throat behind him. Soundlessly, Hannibal turned back around. They stared at each other. Will had pushed his sleeves up crudely to the elbow (typical, wonderful) and synched his belt one notch tighter. The clothes did bag yet it seemed to work on Will. He looked at ease, almost like he’d been put together without a care. Hannibal felt something in his stomach settle. He nodded. They were back in their second skins, comfortable and familiar, yet—

        Hannibal reached out for the bandage on Will’s cheek, fingertips just brushing the cotton padding. Will’s eyes locked with his as he began to pull the bandage off. Its adhesive plucked at fine hairs and stubble, a teasing pain that left Will’s skin mapped out in a red square. When it finally came away, it fell limp into Hannibal’s ready hand.

        The room was hushed as Hannibal examined the long line that cut across Will’s pale face. (A crack in fine china, the break along a teacup’s edge.) The skin there was ruddy, new, and shined under the low light of the room. It transfixed him, made his mouth go dry and his tongue slide over his lips. He brushed a careful finger over the scar, just as he had done with his own. “It’s healed, yet scared,” he whispered.

        Will watched him, unblinking. “I have plenty of those. This one’s hardly impressive.”

        Hannibal closed his eyes and moved away. His chest felt tight (inconvenient.) The clock sitting on the nightstand clicked away next to him. It was time to eat. “Would you?” he asked, gesturing the door.

        Silently, Will nodded.

        When they entered the dining room, Bedelia was sitting with her back straight, hands in her lap, skin still a sickly pale, and a carving fork hidden under her napkin. Hannibal blinked slowly (another mental scolding) and smiled—Bedelia’s confidence continued to astound him. Even now, hobbled by his knife, dazed by her own drug, she still had enough in her to try and fight.

        Hannibal guided Will to his seat and pulled his chair out. Will's eyes cast around before he sat, head cocked towards Bedelia. Hannibal walked back passed Bedelia as he headed towards the kitchen to retrieve some wine. She tensed and gave him a weary glance.

        He caught the motion as her hand slid silently under her napkin.

        Back in the kitchen, Hannibal browsed over the bottles stacked in the small wine cooler fitted into the kitchen wall. His finger skimmed the bottle’s rounded corks, idly moving from one to the next. He stopped when he reached a bottle of Zinfandel, pulled it out, and cradled it in his hands.

        “You think a carving fork will do the trick?”

        Hannibal paused as Will’s voice resonated through the air, pricking at his ears. Or course Will had seen as well, he thought. He walked closer to the kitchen door and waited. In the dining room, Bedelia cleared her throat. “I consider myself an optimist even in the face of… an undeniable end.” Her voice was sluggish yet held its usual elegance. A pause, then: “Did you believe you would die that night?”

        The question was directed towards Will, yet Hannibal mulled over an answer in his head. Thinking of that night made his lungs burn and his teeth taste of salt. “I didn’t really think about the outcome,” Will responded, “simply the act.”

        “The act of rebirth,” there was a laugh trailing Bedelia’s voice. “Which side were you born on this time, Will? Or are the lines still blurred?”

         Hannibal frowned as the conversation died out, leaving the house void of noise. He moved through the doorway and took in the two of them, sitting stiffly, silent. He raised the wine slightly, “Ready to eat?”

        He filled Will’s glass first, leaning over the other’s shoulder so he could smell the natural musk of his hair. Slowly, he moved over to the front of the table, silence still in the air. He stopped behind Bedelia’s chair, giving himself an excellent view of her hidden hands, sweating neck, and a heart that pulsated roughly through the bare skin of her chest. Hannibal bent slightly and touched the lip of the bottle to her glass.

        In a blur, the carving fork flashed out from underneath Bedelia’s napkin, her fist tight around its handle. Her arm lashed at Hannibal’s face like a snake, the prongs of the fork heading towards his eyes. Right before the sharp tips connected with his skin (hovering, so close) Will’s palm slapped against Bedelia’s wrist. The sound of skin on skin boomed across the room.

        Bedelia gasped and threw a despairing look over her shoulder at Will. Her arm shook vigorously in his hold, tears shimmering in her eyes. She gave a small whimper as Will jerked her arm down, slamming it onto the table, and ripped the fork out of her hand.

        Spinning the fork in his fingers, Will jabbed the utensil into the flank of Bedelia’s cooked leg. The metal sliced through the skin with a wet gurgle. With one hand still trapping hers, Will leaned in close and whispered along the side of Bedelia’s face: “His side.”

        This time, Bedelia sobbed.

        Hannibal watched as Will shoved Bedelia’s arm away and sat firmly back in his chair. He picked up his glass and took a generous sip of wine.

        Will’s eyes locked with his and they both smiled.

<><><>

 _Feb, 2030_ —

        The scents of Evyan skin cream, dollar-store lip balm, and the faint remains of _L'Air du Temps_ wafted passed Hannibal’s nose. He opened his eyes and stared up at the colorless ceiling of his cell. The memory playing in his head stopped and tucked itself back into one of the many nooks of his memory palace.

        With a grunt, he sat up in his cot, its rusted springs creaking under the shift of weight (along with his sore back.) His drawings resting on his drawing table—charcoal depictions of European cityscapes and hyperrealistic studies of Will’s face and body, all spun from memory—fluttered softly as he stood. Outside his cell were shadows, born from the maddening weak lighting the florescent lights gave off, and a chair. He walked to the center of his cell. They’d told him he would have a visitor today, a fresh faced novice with a name that dripped “go-getter.”

        One of the FBI’s—and they needed his consultation.

        (Just like old times.)

        Down the hall, the clang of the elevator rang out, sending the other inmates into a whirl of screams and curses. The doors opened and the feminine aromas grew. The click of heels followed shortly after.

        With a smile, Hannibal folded his arms behind his back and waited.


	5. Sherry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For the first time in many, many years, Margot was scared.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 5 (though it's a little filler-y to be an actual chapter...) I mostly wanted to write about the wonderful Margot and give the Verger baby a name! Thank you to everyone who commented/left kudos so far<3 
> 
> (And thank you to) Beta: the astounding kaysaravia1

        For the first time in many, many years, Margot was scared.

        A chill had been resting under her skin for days, making her body oversensitive to the touch of her clothes and the feel of the controlled air of her home. Her heart was tight and it beat cautiously, anticipating (something, anything.) When she looked in the mirror, she could practically see the tension that layered over her brow and shoulders. Sadly, she looked like she had when she was younger: anxious, ready, fearful.

        It was if her brother was still alive, hiding behind every corner—tongue sharpened by hateful words, palm flat and eager to slap.

        Margot dismissed the thought from her mind. She adjusted her spot at the end of her bed so she sat teetering on the edge of the mattress. She smoothed a hand over the silky comforter then down the skirt of her dress. From here, she could see out the large window that spread across the left side of the bedroom. An overtly picturesque landscape (mountains, green forests painted white with snow, cloudless blue skies) dotted with the rooftops of neighboring houses stared back at her.

        She and Alana had moved (fled) to Canada nearly 15 years ago. It was meant to be temporary, yet they ended up staying. “I feel safe here,” Alana had said once while they watched their son, Alexander, play in the backyard of their Ontario home. And it was all Margot needed to finalize their move.

        Since then, she and her family had lived a simple, quiet, _happy_ life.

         And then the phone rang, late at night, jarring them both from sleep and making the warmth in their bed slowly change into a freeze. Alana had slip out of her arms and quietly slunk to the bathroom. Margot followed and watched her wife stand stock still, back seized up and muscles bunched, and listened to her speak, hushed, into the phone.

        At one point, their eyes had met through the mirror above the sink and Margot felt an enormous wave of dread wash over her.

        “I’ll be back by Friday.” Margot looked away from the window and watched Alana step out from their walk-in closet. She was clad only in her panties, showing off her aged yet smooth and bright skin, her favorite dark red suit (her favorite battle armor) draped over her arm.

        Alana moved over to the bed and placed the suit down near Margot’s leg. “Maybe even sooner, God forbid.” She grinned for a second too long, making Margot’s back grow ridged.

        She managed a tight-lip smile then handed Alana her bra. “So, what conference is this again?” she asked. Alana had told her that the call had been an old colleague of hers, Jack Crawford, asking if she would attend a psych conference being held down in Virginia. The conference was happening soon and she needed to fly out “immediately.” But Margot wasn’t dumb. She knew better (much better.)

        There was a pause as Alana slipped her arms through the straps of her bra. She positioned her breasts in the cups and reached around to synch the clasps. “It’s more of a circle jerk, actually,” she finally said. “Probably just a bunch of articles looking for a journal to pick them up, lecturers looking for a spot on TED Talks, that sort of tripe.” She huffed, made a face, and grabbed her red slacks off the bed.

        “Oh,” Margot whispered. She wrung her hands. “You don’t normally go to these kinds of things, though…”

        Alana pulled on a black sleeveless blouse then her suit jacket. She buttoned the front, leaving the top two undone so that it cut a V across her chest. “I told you, Jack asked me to go,” she said, grabbing the luggage that had been packed for days out from besides the bed.

        “I didn’t know that the two of you still spoke.”

        “We don’t. But, it’s good to stay in touch with the people you share history with.” Brushing a hand through her short hair, Alana sighed. Her eyes darted from one side of the room to the other. “I should get going.”

        Margot dipped her head and nodded. She knew that Alana’s intentions were good. She was keeping them safe by blocking her out, but it made Margot’s stomach flip and her hands shake. She stood and grabbed her wife’s hip, stilling her as she walked for the door. Alana gave her a steady look, “What’s the matter?”

        “Just…” Margot started then trailed off. She rubbed her hand along the length of Alana’s arm, head shaking. “Nothing. I'm going to miss you, is all.”

        A brief (knowing) shimmer crossed Alana’s eyes before she smiled. “Me too.” Leaning in, she gave Margot’s lips a quick peck, leaving a faint stain of red from her lipstick across her mouth. She matched her hold and snuck a hand around her waist, pushing their hips together. “Walk me down?”

        Margot smiled, slowly. “Yeah.”

        When they made their way down to the living room, Margot walked over to Alexander. He sat with his earbuds in, steadily typing on his computer. She took a moment to look him over. He had grown into a beautiful young man, with wavy brown hair, a strong jaw, and not a mean spirited bone in his body. He was the pride of Margot’s life and the restoration of the Verger name. “Alex.”

        Turning his head, Alexander looked over his shoulder (at her, passed her.) He smiled brightly and took out his earbuds. “You leaving now?” he asked, standing and jogging over Alana, embracing his mother in a hug.

        Alana wrapped her arms around him with a hum and kissed the side of his face. “I’ll be back soon, ok? So look after your mom,” another kiss, “and the house.” One more press of the lips and she let Alexander go. She took ahold of her luggage, extending its handle and balancing it on its wheels. She looked over at Margot and held out a hand.

        Margot grabbed it (gripped it, fingers digging,) forced smile in place. “Be safe,” she said, though the words sounded faded in her ears.

        Alana smiled and opened the front door. A car was waiting in the graveled driveway, driver waiting with the back seat open. He met Alana as she walked down the front steps and took her luggage to the trunk. Before climbing into the car, Alana turned back and smiled, waved. And then she was gone, driving off down their yard and disappearing behind the line of trees surrounding their home.

        For a moment, all Margot could do was stand still. She huddled to the side of the doorway and stared out at the point where the car had gone, unblinking. The tightness that circled her heart seemed to let go, unleashing it to beat-beat- _beat_ against her chest. Something, anything (everything,) was happening and her family was walking right into it. They were stepping back into the skins they’d shed almost a lifetime ago, and she knew she could do nothing to stop it.

        “Mom?”

        She wrenched herself out of a daze and turned around, shutting the door behind her, locking it soundly. Alexander stood close by, watching her with a timid look on his face. “Are you okay?”

        For the first time in many, many years—

        “I'm fine,” she said and moved to give her son’s shoulder a squeeze.

        —Margot was _terrified_.


	6. Chianti

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “My husband is very dear to me. I think of him often, constantly even.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woo, this chapter was fun to write. I wish I made it a bit longer though, but looking over the SotL script, Hanni and Clarice's first conversation was shorter than I remembered... Anywho, thank you to everyone who has left a comment/kudos so far and to whoever is still following this silly story! 
> 
> Beta: the marvelous kaysaravia1  
> (Rated M for some mild language)

        The elevator’s engine clattered to a halt and Barney slid open the doors. The drone of raised voices resounded through the air, filling Clarice’s ears till they rung.

        “Here we are, Officer Starling,” Barney said. He shuffled to the corner of the elevator, clearing the entranceway. Clarice stuck her head out into the hallway and the voices grew even louder.

        The interior of the lower block was the complete opposite from that of the rest of the hospital— concrete, narrow, dreadfully plain. It lacked the extravagant décor Clarice had seen on the upper-levels; no sleek molding or varnished wood, no tapering windows (no windows at all.) Florescent lights hung in rows of three, staining everything in a sickly yellow light. The shining heads of Chilton’s surveillance cameras dotted the ceiling, each positioned inches away from the cells that lined the left-hand side of the hallway.

        It was like the entire wing had been an afterthought—a blemish  covered up.

        Behind her, Barney shifted his weight, making the lift creak. “Now, Dr. Lecter’s cell is at the very end there.” Clarice followed the line he made with his finger, all the way back into the darkest part of the block. “I put a chair out for you.”

        “Thank you,” Clarice managed a smile before advancing into the hall.

        “Don’t you worry now, Officer Starling,” Barney called. His voice sounded far off. “We’ll be watchin’ you. You’ll do fine.”

        Coming into view of the first cell, Clarice peaked inside and locked eyes with its inhabitants: a large man with a swastika tattooed on his throat and a swollen eye. She braced herself as he jumped forward and slammed his fists into the bars of his cell. She had seen prisoners before, been around all sorts. And she didn’t scare easily. To her (even if that sat lowered into the ground, surrounded by the dark) these people were as threatening as the actors that she had played make-believe with at the FBI simulations center.

        Clarice gripped her purse as she walked on, passing one cruel face after another, ducking venomous words and steering far away from the reaches of fingers through bars. In the second to last cell, a thin, crazed looking man pressed himself up against the cell rods. His issued jumpsuit hung from his body loosely, dirtied, ripped. Sweat, mucus, and spit matted down the wiry beard that sprouted out from his face and his tongue lapped at cracked lips as he hissed at her—his words made Clarice’s skin crawl and her head ache.

        Stopping at the chair that had been set up, Clarice straightened her back and peered into the last cell.

        Behind a double row of thick bars, Dr. Hannibal Lecter stared back at her. He stood centered in his cell, arms positioned behind his back. Unlike the rest of the inmates, he was silent and still. An almost tangible (heavy) ambiance clung around him, like a shade Clarice couldn’t seem to move out from under. The information in the dossier had put him at 65, yet his physique was vibrant, built, full of strength. His face was also surprisingly young for his age: minimal wrinkles, skin still tight around the cheekbones and jaw, hair still dark.

        Eyes still sharp (still black.)

        As he breathed, Lecter’s broad chest rose and fell, slowly, calmly, deliberate. “Good evening,” he said. His voice was steady with a lilting accent. It cut through any other noise that hung in the air, putting a hush over everything.

        Clarice gave the now quiet hallway a glance. She cleared her throat. “Hello, Dr. Lecter. My name is Clarice Starling, with the FBI.” She held up her ID before dropping it securely into her purse. “Do you mind if we talk a bit today?”

        Without missing a beat, Lecter responded, “What did my cellmate say?”

        The words Clarice had prepared die in the back of her throat, leaving her jaw to hang. She blinked and swallowed dryly, “Pardon?”

        “Just now. What did he say to you?” Lecter’s voice stayed even and his gaze rested firmly on Clarice’s face, watching carefully as a steady flush spread itself across her cheeks.

        Lecter wanted to rile her up, Clarice knew—she was more than sure that he had heard the obscene words his neighbor had spat at her. Now he was just testing how strong her skin was, how far he could jab into her before hitting a nerve; see what could throw her off kilter and turn the whole situation in his favor. _Chronic manipulative behavior_ had been (underlined, bolded) in his file.

        With that thought, Clarice indulged him with a tight-lip smile. “He said ‘I can smell your cunt.’”

        An exasperated breath escaped Lecter’s mouth, long and tired. Something crawled across every line is his skin, making his lips twitch and his nose flare and his face dark. He shook his head. “My apologizes. That was quite rude of Miggs, wasn’t it?”

        Clarice looked to the neighboring cell. “Miggs” was staring back at her, his hand shoved down the front of his pants, wriggling. Clarice grimaced and turned away, “I’ve met worse.”

        “Even after countless talks with him, he still doesn’t understand the concept of good manners,” Lecter said, face regaining its measured expression.

        “I see,” Clarice tucked her purse close to her chest and sat down in the chair. “So even in here you find time to continue your psychiatric work?”

        Lecter tilted a sharp jaw and moved his hand to tap against the cell’s adjoining wall. “A perfect place for it, don’t you think? I'm never without a patient.”

        “Ah,” Clarice nodded slowly. She let her eyes wander passed Lecter’s shoulder to the cluttered table inside the cell. Intricate sketches sat scattered and piled on its top. Most were of striking buildings with smooth arches and sturdy looking bridges. The rest, besides a scattering of landscapes and swirling floral designs, were depictions of the same thing over and over again. Entire pages were dedicated to profiles and portraits, to whole body studies (some clothed, some nude) to detailed images of doe-like eyes, pursed lips, hands in motion.

        To a man with a handsome look, bouncing curls, and a cheek cut with a scar. Clarice recognized him instantly. “Did you make those?” she pointed towards the jumbled collection of paper. “The drawings?”

        Lecter cocked his head to the side. “They are my windows.”

        “They're beautiful.”

        With a hum, Lecter strolled across his cell to stand in front of the table. He fingered a page that illustrated a maze of grandiose buildings, their brick walls sloping and bending with one another. Charcoal figures milled around the bottom of the page, all looking towards a squat fountain topped with a statue centered in the clearing of the buildings. “Piazza della Signoria,” he said. He looked at her. “Do you know Florence, Clarice?”

        (Coming from him, her name sounded strange.) Clarice smiled politely and shook her head, “Afraid not.”

        Lecter turned back to his drawing. He let a finger trace across the page, carefully, and stopped in between a parting in the sketched out crowd. “There is a granite marker inlayed into the pavement there. It remembers the date when Girolamo Savonarola’s body was burned after being hanged for heresy. He tricked a countless number of people into believing his divine visions and prophecies about the coming of God were true.”

        He moved back to his spot in the middle of the cell, brushing a hand against one of the drawings of the man’s face as he went. “Easy thing to do back then, I suppose. People were so naïve and knew so little. They were willing to believe almost anything.”

        “No more so than we are now,” Clarice added.

        The edges of Lecter’s eyes creased. One corner of his mouth twitched and stayed. “My thoughts exactly.”

        Their conversation died out then, leaving the air between them empty and chilled. Clarice took the moment to unzip the inner pouch of her purse and pull out the questionnaire Sesske had given her. She turned it towards Lecter. “Well, uh, Dr. Lecter, I would like to start off with a couple of questions.”

        Lecter stared passed the page in her hand, directly into Clarice’s eyes: “You're doing quite well without.”

        Clarice’s brow furrowed and the paper fell limply in her hand. “Ah—thank you. But, Dr. Lecter, if you could just—”

        “It must be bustling down at the FBI for them to send me a…trainee.” He took a step closer to the bars, lips still curled. “Yes very busy, scrambling to catch their new monster. “Buffalo Bill” I’ve heard.” A knot in Clarice’s throat formed. She swallowed the tension back and placed the questionnaire on her lap.

        Lecter continued. “How many women has he flayed? 4? 5?” He made a contemplating face. “He does skin them, correct? The newspapers won’t delve into such dark things.”

        (The knot tightened still) “That’s an ongoing investigation. I'm not a part of that.” Clarice paused to take a calming breath as Lecter gave a soft, “Of course you’re not.” He was still testing, teasing, still jabbing; slowly tightening up her strings, trying to make her dance. But Clarice held, sweated it out (like always.) She held the questionnaire higher. “Now, Dr. Lecter, I'm only asking that you will look at this—”

        “Let’s not bring that up again, shall we?” Lecter intervened, voice drowning hers out (choking it) with ease. “Tests are inane and insulting to both of our intellects. Tell me about Dr. Chilton instead, Clarice.”

        His words almost made Clarice splutter. “Why?”

        “You must have met him,” Lecter continued. He took one more step, this time face hovering close to the bars. Another curl of the lips, “How was _his_ skin?”

        Clarice felt her eyes flutter shut as a feeling of repulsion stroked down her spine. Exhaling, she gave a polite smile and grabbed up her purse. She knew this tactic: avoidance, mockery; she also knew that Lecter’s game was getting them nowhere (exactly where he preferred them to stay.) Standing, she gave a small nod. “Sorry for wasting your time, Dr. Lecter.”

        She took a step (another, three) down the hall before: “Officer Starling.”

        Clarice stopped. She squared her jaw and leveled a look over her shoulder. Lecter stared back, body still close to the bars, arms again behind his back. He glanced at the questionnaire still gripped in her hand. “Send that through.”

        A square metal door connected to a drawer sat in between the bars closest to the wall. Clarice walked over to it, Lecter leisurely pacing along with her (trailing, stalking) and opened the slot. She quickly slipped the questionnaire in and slammed the door shut. The drawer popped out inside the cell.

        Delicately, Lecter picked the papers up out of the shoot. He skimmed it with quick eyes. “So the FBI wants to hear what I have to say over the minds of the criminally insane, or in this case, one mind.” He dropped to the bottom of the first page, read it, then flipped to the next. “Yet…this is definitely not over a certain “ongoing investigation”?”

        Clarice watched as Lecter dropped the questionnaire unceremoniously back into the drawer. He shoved it forward, pushing it back through the metal door with a clang.

        A smug look graced Lecter’s face as Clarice flinched and he leered, “In that case, tell them to go read my dissertation.”

        The tops of Clarice’s teeth grounded together as she bit back a mouthful of ire. She opened her mouth and scoffed before she could catch herself. “You seem like a man who loves attention, Dr. Lecter, and seeing that you have mine in full, you must be having a wonderful time.” She sat back down in the chair, nerves set and ready. “And I'm sure you also love to hear yourself talk, so, let’s talk.”

        After a moment (after a frightening glint had entered his eyes and his chin dipped down to his chest) Lecter whispered , “You are quite ambitious, aren’t you? How determined are you to get out of the slim pickings of the FBI and finally become one of the big boys? Very, I’d say.” He raised a pale eyebrow. “What would you be willing to do to catch the bad guys and act the hero, Clarice? Something naughty, something devilish?”

        Clarice bristled (teeth clicking once again,) “I’d do anything to uphold the law.”

        Lecter breathed slowly. “You remind me of another young lady I once knew. She was very much like you—striving, fearless, oh-so clever. She liked to stick her arm down rabbit holes and see what she could pull out. Do you know what became of her, Clarice?”

        Clarice shrugged, “You ate her?”

        Lecter gave a chuckle (amused, slightly reminiscent, a laugh tied to a memory) and turned away. He walked over to the small drawing table and studied a sketch of a small house on a bluff. “Do you know what quid pro quo means?” He rolled a hand through the air as if giving a lecture. “It’s Latin for an exchange. One transfer contingent upon another; give some, get some.”

        “You want something?”

        “Don’t we all?”

        Clarice shook her head then. “I'm sorry Dr. Lecter, but we don’t strike deals with anyone, especially with convicts such as yourself.”

        “Do you honestly believe that?” Lecter asked, eyes scanning the air around her face. He _tsk_ ed, “Those who follow the light blindly will be blinded by it, Clarice. I suggest you stop trusting everything the FBI tries to spoon-feed you; many unsavory results have happened because of just that.” Moving back to his drawings, Lecter swept his hand across the table, picking up a page along the way (a charcoal sketch of an exposed neck and tilted head.) He blinked down at it before stroking its edges.

        “I would like for you to check on someone for me.”

        Clarice glanced at the drawing in his hand. “Will Graham.”

        The name settled in the air like a weight, one that visibly dragged the sturdy line of Lecter’s shoulder down into a slump. A hollow expression draped itself over the dips and edges of his face, casting his eyes into oily shadows; like this, the man finally looked his age.

        For a beat, he stood rigid, drawing cradled in his hands (thumbs rubbing the toothy-paper in slow circles.) He opened his mouth, shut it, swallowed, then moved away. Sitting on the cot pushed against the far wall, back straight, feet planted, he finally said, “Yes.”

        Something dismal had laced its way through his voice—something that made Clarice warily lean further back in her seat. “My husband is very dear to me. I think of him often, constantly even.”

        Clarice gawked briefly, eyes widening. “Your husband? I-I wasn’t aware that the two of you—” she stopped, rewound. “You want me to check up on…Mr. Graham and what exactly?”

        “Be my eyes. It is getting to a rather unbearable point for me. Our disjoining has been horrendously testing. Five years have passed since I’ve last seen him and I need to know if he is being taken care of. I need to know the state of his health, his mentality; what he is thinking, feeling. I need to get his scent back, even if by theoretical means.” A pause and Lecter sighed faintly. “Also, to deliver an apology.”

        There was no need to ask for clarification: “It was my mistake that costed us our freedom.”

        Clarice arched a brow, “The mistake of committing multiple homicides and evading federal arrest, you mean?”

        The scowl Lecter gave her held heat. “I’ve never had a palate for nasty tongues, Clarice. I’d keep yours wrangled before someone comes along and rips it out,” he hissed.

        He glowered across his cell for a moment longer before tucking in his legs and sliding himself out along the cot, back flat. He gently placed the drawing over his chest and folded his hands above it, gathering it close. Tipping his head back into the form of his pillow, he stretched his legs with a pop and a groan. “I was too slow,” he said, “and the forces that be were far too many that day. I failed him and was never given the time to ask for forgiveness.”

        Another pause, another sigh, then, “You do these things for me and I will tell you anything you want to know about our boy Bill.”

        Clarice watched as Lecter shut his eyes. A cold sweat had worked its way onto the back of her neck. Under her chest, her heart raced. Everything he had said about her was true—she was ambitious, extremely so. It had taken her years to pit the pure West Virginian out of her. Years to shed the simple country girl guise people automatically associated with her. Years of working and studying and waiting (patiently, _painstakingly_ waiting.) So of course she would do anything to advance in the ranks and to catch Buffalo Bill and to be the hero. She would even make a deal with the devil behind the FBI’s back.

        “Wait.” Her train of thought lurched to a stop as she remembered, “Will Graham is being held in solitary confinement. I won’t be able to contact him.”

        From his spot in bed, Lecter tutted, “Clarice.” He made a face one would see a parent give their misbehaving child; all that was missing was a wag of his finger. “Surely that shouldn’t be an issue, not for someone like you. I'm sure you’ll think of something.”

        Clarice swallowed, blinked (hard) and clarified, “So, I will check on Mr. Graham and you will then aid in the investigation, yes?”

        Eyes snapping back open, Lecter turn his head to the side, gaze seamlessly locking back onto hers. “I promise. And I always keep my promises, Clarice.”

        “Somehow I don’t doubt that.”

        For the first time during the course of their meeting, Lecter smiled, fully and intensely; one that lit up his face and pulled lips over sharp teeth, one that made Clarice shudder. “I suggest you get going,” he said. “My lips are sealed at the moment, yet I fear that sweet Bill is readying to pounce on new prey.”

        Clarice breathed in, out (again) as Lecter’s smile grew larger. “Any day now.”

        And with that, all the lights in the in the hall went out.

<><><>

        Barney looked down at his watch and put away the magazine he had been reading. Standing up from his chair and adjusting the hat on his head, he began walking towards the elevator.

        Dr. Chilton had instructed him to fetch Officer Starling right at 7:00 (no sooner, no later) and escort her back to his office. “Try not to let her wander, Barney,” he’d said while watching his computer, the single feed of Lecter’s cell blown up 100%. “She seems the type.”

        “Seems alright to me, sir,” Barney had added.

        “That’s the thing about federal dogs,” Chilton muttered. “You’re never sure if the one you get is a bitch or not.”

        Barney understood his boss’s distaste for cops— he had a history with them. He’d worked with them, trusted them, and then one of them ended up almost killing him. Barney himself had run-ins with the authorities (albeit nothing like Dr. Chilton) from back when he was younger, but so far, he liked Officer Starling. She was a lady, pretty and sweet, but had a pair of balls on her.

        You’d have to if you’d be willing to go talk to a psychopath, Barney thought with a chuckle. He reached the elevator and began to slide the decorative doors open, yet paused. The clank of cables and metal echoed through the wall. Stepping back, Barney waited till the elevator came to a halt, hands rubbing together, anticipating, confused.

        When the doors opened, Officer Starling stumbled out. Her hair was tussled about and her forehead was covered in sweat. She gave him a wide-eyed look.

        “Officer Starling?” Barney said. He looked behind the other’s shoulder into the darkened elevator and gasped: “Did the lights go off on you down there?”

        “Yes…” Starling’s voice was hoarse. She swallowed audibly. “Uh, I’ll need to retrieve my, uh, service pistol now.”Without hesitation, she started towards Chilton’s office.

        Barney hiked up the waist of his pants and jogged after her, head shaking. “I'm so sorry about that, Officer Starling. I was comin’ to get you,” he sped forward just in time to hold the glass door open for her, though it did little to slow her pace. He kept on, trailing behind, till they reached Chilton’s office. By then, Barney’s chest was heaving and his breath was shallow. (His job did not consist of running.) “Well, did you at least get what you need?”

        Starling left his question unanswered as she slipped through Chilton’s office door. Barney stood panting and removed his hat so he could wipe a hand over his balding head. He didn’t blame her for getting a bit frazzled. Getting caught in the dark on the lower levels of the hospital could make any grown person piss their pants; it was a scary place down there.

        Barely a minute after, Starling bustled back out into the hall, hands hurriedly slipping her gun back into its holster, and leaving the office door open. From the hall, Barney caught sight of Dr. Chilton sitting behind his desk. Their eyes met and Chilton shook his head, exasperated, irritated. He turned back around to watch as Officer Starling walked briskly along the hallway and into the stretch of the lobby.

        She did not look back and was out of the building in a matter of seconds.


	7. Syrah

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Precious!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Filler, filler, filler! Yey for fillers! Just a chapter to introduce a more...fluffy character to the story. Thank you to everyone leaving comments/kudos on this thing! You're the best!
> 
> Beta: the superb kaysaravia1  
> (Rated M for some language)

        Catherine Martin drummed her fingers against the curve of her steering wheel while her legs bounced and her head rocked. _Mary Jane's Last Dance_ played on the radio, its blaring volume straining against the car’s old speakers. In the passenger’s seat, a pack of M &Ms, cheap beer, and dollar store popcorn shuffled in a plastic bag.

        “Oh, my my! Oh, hell yes!” Catherine sang along. She stamped her foot down on the accelerator, sending her car flying over the small speedbumps outside her apartment’s parking lot. Driving up the back of the buildings, she picked a spot and put the car in park.

        “I feel summer creepin' in and I'm…not a good singer,” Catherine laughed lightly as the song ended. She killed the engine and gathered her groceries, sneaking a bit of popcorn from its already opened bag. Her late night food runs had been getting more and more frequent (each time the same buys: chocolate, something salty, and alcohol.) She blamed it on her boyfriend, though—him and the outrageous appetite his recreational marijuana always gave her.

        Catherine bustled out of her car with a groan. The soft, chilled breeze in the air hit her face evenly and instantly. She fumbled with her coat, wrapping it tighter around her curvy middle and trying to grapple her thick hair out from under its collar. With a sniff, she began the trek up to her apartment.

        The lights from her apartment could be seen through the highest window of the building, warm and inviting compared to the darkness she waded through. Along the outskirts of the apartment complex, bare trees creaked and swayed together in a slow wave. Between their thin limbs, minuscule points of light from the nearby city could be seen. Passed that was just sky, black and endless.

        Catherine gave the woods a glance before looking back to her apartment window, then nearly jumping out of her skin as a bark broke through the still air, stumbling over her own feet and letting out a scream.

        Whipping her head around (heart pounding from the sudden jolt of adrenaline, shoulders tense) Catherine locked eyes with a small, white poodle. The dog looked up at her, standing out starkly against the dark asphalt of the parking lot, nubby tail wagging and puffed fur moving with the breeze. It took a delicate step forward, the blue collar around its neck jingling, then sat, head cocked.

        “Shit,” Catherine whispered, then laughed, unclenching her hand to dab at her forehead. She let her muscles relax and her breath come out in a gust. “Oh, you scared me,” she said, putting her groceries down as she kneeled on the ground. She held out a hand.

        The dog walked over without a pause. It snuffled her palm with a wet nose, tail still shaking to and fro. Another laugh, “What are you doing out here, huh? Where’s your mommy and daddy?” Catherine awwed as she ran her fingers through the dog’s curly fur. This close, she could almost see her reflection in the black dots of its eyes.

        “ _Precious_!”

        Catherine looked up as a slurred voice echoed across the parking lot. From the dark, a man in a running jacket and hat came bounding out. He jogged over (panting,) his lanky body moving awkwardly with each step. The top half of his face was covered in shadows, leaving only his square chin and slanted lips visible. Wrapped around one of his hands was a thin blue leash, its clasp empty; the other was wrapped up in a cast.

        “Precious! There you are!” he called, coming to a stop next to the dog. He breathed in harshly through his nose as he bent over and clipped the leash onto the loop of Precious’ collar.

        “Oh, is this your dog?”

        The man shot Catherine a look before nodding his head several times up and down. “Yeah, yeah, she…she got away from me.”

        Giving Precious one last pat on the head, Catherina smiled, “She’s a sweetheart.”Grabbing her bag, she stood back up and brushed off the front of her jeans. She gave the man a smile as he whispered to his dog and pulled her jacket tighter around her waist. She felt a satisfaction for reuniting the pair (“A job well done,” her mother would say.) She nodded, “Well, it was nice meeting you guys.” Once last smile, and Catherine began walking:

        “So, what are you? Like a size 14?”

        She turned back with a furrowed brow. The man stood where she’d left him (Closer?) both he and Precious watching her intently. She blinked, “Sorry, what?”

        Catherine felt her mouth fall open as the man looked her body up and down, head tipped just so to reveal dull, close, black eyes. “That’s OK,” he said. A smile grew on his face, lips thinning over crooked teeth. “I like fat girls.”

        A flush spread across Catherine’s cheeks, embarrassment setting in, angry heat following close behind. She did not need this. Her entire life was riddled with pricks like this. Over times she had learned to ignore, steer away from, and even knock them down a peg with her own dosage of insults, but that didn’t mean that is didn’t still royally piss her off.

        Slowly shutting her mouth, Catherine tightened her lips into the hardest sneer she could muster. “Uh-huh. How ‘bout you go fuck yourself, buddy.” After a beat, she added, “You and your stupid dog.” She combatted the blank look the man gave her with a sharp lift of her chin and turned on her heels, hair swinging wildly.

        Hurrying up the stretch of asphalt, she jammed her fist into her coat pocket, fishing for her key. “Fucking unbelievable,” she muttered.

        She stepped onto the stoop of the complex’s back door and stabbed her key into the lock, scraping metal against metal. Frown still in place, Catherine looked over her shoulder, eyes scanning. Both man and mutt were gone. Good, she thought and began pushing the door open.

        Suddenly (before her mind could register the sound of shuffling feet, before she could sense another body closing in behind her own) something hard hit the back of Catherine’s head. Her body jumped, fingers splaying out stiff so her key and bag dropped to the ground in a crash. Her eyes crossed and her knees buckled slightly. Garbled, messy, disoriented words spilled from her mouth as she tried to look around. The world around her spun and something wet dripped down her scalp.

        She shakily turned around (mute, dazed) and stared at the man behind her. His dull eyes were shining and his cast-clad arm was raised in the air. It dropped, quickly, and connected with her skull once more with a sickening _thump_.

        Catherine’s yelp caught in her throat and everything went black.


	8. Malbec

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will knew this feeling well; he’d felt this strange enrapturement many, many times before—  
> He was hunting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the long wait :'v (Time and school got the better of me for a moment...) But here's chapter 8 or my excuse to write about poor, sweet Will acting deranged and homicidal. A giant thank you to everyone still following the story and leaving comments/kudos. You guys are truly beautiful!
> 
> Beta: the stupendous kaysaravia1
> 
> (Rated M for depictions of violence)

_ _

Staff Notification

**Reading Psychiatric Institute in Pennsylvania – Inpatient Confinement & Procedure **

 

**Patient Information:**

  * Patient Name:       Will Graham
  * DOB:                      June 19, 1975
  * Patient Number:    B1327-5



**Facility Information:**

  * Hospital Name:     Reading Psychiatric Institute in Pennsylvania Hospital
  * MRN:                      87332199
  * Event Type:            Inpatient Confinement & Procedure Notification
  * Event Time:           13:45 – 1/31/2030



 

        Due to increasing hostility and the malicious actions that took place on January 29th. 2030 at 12:03, inpatient B1327-5 has been deemed suitable for transfer into solitary confinement. Standard restrictions and holdings have been applied as of 09:00 this morning. Staff and patient procedure pertaining to B1327-5 have also been modified (e.g. patient restraints, distance/proximity to patient, interaction with patient, reduced eye contact) and has been sent out to RPIP’s query portal.

        Please note that these new procedures will be enforced for the benefit of all persons and staff of the hospital.

_Devera Antrim, Ph.D._

_Acting Head of Psychiatry Department_

 

_< ><><>_

_Jan, 2030—_

        Will stood in the middle of his cell, uniform top discarded on the floor near his feet. Steam swirled through the air around him and kissed at the bared skin of his chest, the heat rising from the running water of the sink he stood in front of. It fogged the surface of the bathroom mirror he stared at and blurred his reflection, left him unrecognizable.

        Watered-down foam dripped (slick and slow) along the sides of his face. Streaks of it ran the length of his neck, following the diagonals of his vocal cords and collecting in the small dip of his collarbone. The dark hairs of his beard poked through the foam like dying grass through snow. Tipping his jaw (one way, another,) Will examined the line of his face and neck.

        A pause, then Will breathed deeply and brought the safety razor nestled in his palm up to his jaw. After his specks of grey began interweaving with brown, he’d decided it was time for a shave. It was an almost disheartening decision; he had kept his beard grown for the last decade and a half. It had become him, was him. And yet, on the morning when he woke to a shimmer of silver dancing over his face, he couldn’t wait to be rid of it.

        With a final sigh, Will hesitantly connected the razor to his face. He raked it downwards (top of the cheek to the underside of his jawline,) the razor hissing at the friction of metal against skin. It cut through the foam and the hair, leaving a naked strip of skin in its wake. He repeated the motion again and again—many more times than anticipated, as the institution-issued safety razor consisted of a blade placed so far back in the plastic holder that it hardly managed a bristle in one go—until his chin and jaw and lip was smooth.

        Remnants of foam and whiskers covered the top of the heated water, spiraling slowly. The tempered air from the vent implanted in the cell’s ceiling brushed against his newly shorn skin, its chill leaving it sensitive and itchy. Grabbing the towel that sat folded on the sink’s edge, Will dabbed it over his face.

        When he pulled it away, he saw red.

        Dribs of blood dotted the white cotton of the towel, their edges growing, seeping through the fibers. Will blinked down at them for a long moment. Frowning, moved a hand over the fogged glass of the mirror. Reflection now sharp, he could see the nick plainly: the blade had cut his scar.

        Blinking, Will raised his free hand and touched the swell of the pink line that decorated his cheek. He traced it absently, following its jagged trail all the way up to the jut of his cheekbone, fingertips smearing fresh blood. It was smooth and soft and, after all this time hidden from view, foreign.

        Will watched himself through the mirror; watched himself stroke at the scar then turn his fingers to his lips; watched himself open his mouth, letting his tongue dart out and lap at the dark stains on his hand, tasting them. A metallic hint blossomed in his mouth then, making him swallow automatically, throat suddenly dry.

        Slowly, he extracted his fingers from his mouth and dipped them into the sink. The remaining blood washed into the stagnant water like wisps dancing in front of his eyes. Will stared on until the wisps twisted deeper within the water and vanished before looking back to the mirror.

        There, trapped behind the glass, a nightmarish figure stared back at him.

        Its face was a perfect facsimile of his own—same parted lips, same rounded nose, same curling hair. Same scars, each one coated in an almost steely luster—yet its skin was the color of coal, ashen and dull. Its eyes sat sunken into its skull, hooded by creased lids and accentuated by shadows. Its pupils and iris were painted over with a blank white gloss. From the black waves of its hair, a pair of thick, sturdy antlers grew upwards (too high, high enough to pass the boundaries of the mirror.) Sharp, ebony prongs branched out into the space above its head, crowning it.

        Will stared at it for a moment (keenly, quietly) too transfixed to look away. Its white eyes pinned him still and stopped his breath in his throat. They breathed in unison, keeping pace with one another, before the reflection moved on its own. Its large antlers creaked as it cocked its head, its moon-like eyes shimmering as they looked downwards.

        Following its gaze (down to him, his hand) Will slowly looked down to the razor still clasped in his fingers. Breathing sharply, he brought the razor up. This close, he could see the fill of blood that still rested in between the blade and its plastic holder.

        Everything was quiet as he studied it—a passing of silence where the only sound Will could hear was the blood that roared away in his ears—before footsteps echoed through the air.

        Will turned his head towards the entranceway of his cell. Out it, he could see the white face of the clock that hung on the opposing wall. It read noon, the time when a hospital attendant would normally be bringing down his lunch. He listened to the footsteps again, the light approach of a designated nurse. She (Female? Yes.) brought an airy scent of pomegranate body wash and a note of disinfectant with her; a combination of smells that wafted down the hallway and flittered through the bars of his cell like an intrusive guest.

        As the footsteps grew closer, Will glanced back at the image in the mirror. It was waiting for him, watching, with its head still cocked, eyes still fixed with the razor.

        It nodded then (a dip of the head) and Will understood.

        Tipping the razor down so the face of the blade sat flat against the edge of the sink, Will began pressing down on it. His arm strained as he exerted his weight onto the instrument. Tremors ran down his bunched muscles and shook the body of the sink, sending murky water splashing over the bowl. A brief time passed before the razor’s weak handle broke off with a tight _snap_ , sharp triangular pieces of plastic flying onto the floor.

        Frantically, Will grabbed the remaining rectangle of plastic with both hands. He pinched its edges with his fingers, pressing them with such a force that the skin there broke and bled. Arms shaking violently, Will pressed the razor’s head against the sink one last time. The plastic holder cracked and split and shattered, sending him jerking forward. The sleek blade shot off and fell into the shrapnel of plastic on the ground.

        Will breathed deeply as he straightened from his hunch over the sink. He stared down at the blade, stark silver against the dull grey concrete of the floor. He picked it up and held it in a bloody palm. Light gleamed off it, bounced around his skin before settling on his eyes.

        In the pockets of his nostrils, the sweet mix of pomegranate and disinfectant returned, intensely sweet. It pricked at the undersides of his eyes, making them water and sending a shiver across the dip of his back, up his spine, hairs on the back of his neck standing on end. The scent spread down the back of his throat, along his tongue, layering it. It gathered in his stomach like a solid weight, filling him to the top while at the same time leaving him starved.

        Will knew this feeling well; he’d felt this strange enrapturement many, many times before ( _hadn’t_ felt it in the five long years of imprisonment)—

        He was hunting.

        Outside his cell, the footsteps finally arrived: a woman, no older than 30, with a fresh face and rounded cheeks. She wore a standard uniform, her blonde hair thrown over her shoulder revealing the name tag clipped onto her shirt pocket: _Audrey_. In her hands was a thin tray carrying a discolored serving of ground meat, a protein bar, and fruit.

        “Time to eat,” she said offhandedly (eyes not meeting his, not meeting anything. Blissfully indifferent, blissfully unaware of the life around her, her own life; of the blood that already dripped from his hands or the blade sheathed in the bunch of his hand.)

        Will watched as she sat the tray on the small metal shelf attached to a foot long opening built into the bars of his cell. She slid the tray through the slot so it sat on his side of the shelf. Pulling her hands away, she dipped one into the pocket of her shirt, fishing out a packaged plastic spoon. It’s plastic wrapper crunched as she placed it on the surface of the shelf and edged it into the cell.

        And then—while his prey remained ignorant, innocent, while his prey’s hand was just passed the threshold of his bars, his domain—Will lashed out, left hand catching the nurse’s stretched out wrist and holding it firmly against the shelf.

        Immediately (oblivious haze finally clearing from her face, parting like muddied clouds) the nurse let out a startled scream. Her wide eyes locked with his (fear, pain, shock skittering across them) and she tugged at his grip, the sudden movement sending both the spoon and the tray of food clattering to the ground. Will held her tighter, bruising skin, grinding bone, and pulled her closer with a sharp jerk.

        Another scream and the nurse stumbled forward, forehead colliding with the bars soundly. She sagged slightly, dropping her head, and Will snagged the bottom of her face through the cell door with his other hand—pinky, ring, and middle finger holding the blade to his palm while his and thumb and pointer finger squeezed her cheeks till her lips puckered, fleshy corners pinching together, the soft skin around her mouth reddening at the pressure. She gave a small whimper as Will flipped the razor blade in his fingers and slowly brought its edge up, touching it lightly to the swell of her bottom lip.

        “There, there,” Will whispered as he pushed the lip down and shoved the razor’s point into the gap below pink gums. “ _Shh, shh-shh…_ ”

        The attendant jerked and screamed and spat, her head vibrating in his hand, arm rattling in his hold, as she strained against him. The stomp of her feet against the floor of the hallway echoed in Will’s deft ears. In one smooth motion, he guided the razor through the velvet skin. A short, sharp, spritz of blood followed the slight curve of the blade; it speckled the plane of Will’s naked chin and chest, showering him, ornamenting him. The nurse’s screams spluttered into a breathless gasps as the blade shaved through her lip till it hung off to the side, swinging open to reveal the flat white faces of her bottom teeth.

        Will _shh_ ed her once more as slick tears rolled down her face, staining her reddened cheeks and leaving clean lines through the mat of blood on her jaw. Rolling his head to the side, he dropped the blade to the ground and pressed his face against the bars. He stretched his mouth through the space of metal and with a bite of his teeth, severed the last bit of attached skin.

        The lip came away with another spurt of blood and fell limply into Will’s awaiting mouth. Its soft skin flattened and teared with every pop of his jaw, teeth grinding it over. Its underdone taste seeped down his throat in bitter waves and caught in the spaces of his incisors.

        By then (after only seconds, quick yet endless seconds) a group of people arrived, called upon by the nurse’s initial screams. As they ran down the hallway, yelling, gasping, Will backed up, releasing his hold. He watched as the nurse wobbled backwards, the outline of her body shaking fiercely, before her knees buckled and she hit the floor.

        The band of people that flocked to her consisted of guards and other attendants. Their bodies whirled in the commotion, feet stumbling, hands clawing through the air, grasping and pulling the nurse away from the bars, trying to shield her from the terror that had already passed. One attendant cupped her hands around her sawed skin before turning and crying curses in Will’s face; another lurched away from the gore, nausea hitting and causing him to vomit down his front.

        Will watched as half the crowd spirited the nurse’s limp body down the hall while the rest backed away from his cell, all pale-faced, shell shocked. In the corner of his eye, he could see his nightmarish self still reflected in the mirror, a red smear now covering its ebony mouth.

        It smiled sweetly as Will took one more bite of the flesh between his teeth and swallowed it raw.

* * *

 

(P.S. Wendigo!Will was absolutely inspired by [this](http://feredir.tumblr.com/post/86846629269/the-two-paintings-that-i-tried-to-make-a-gif-out) gorgeous piece of art by feredir <3)


	9. Grechetto

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Separation is-is akin to suffocation for the two of us."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just like our beautiful murder husbands, this story is still alive!! Sorry for the wait yet again:,( but you guys have been so awesome and patient! I can't tell you how thankful I am<3   
> But anyway, here's chapter 9 a.k.a the return of farm animal analogies.  
> Beta: the always killer kaysaravia1  
> (Rated M for some language)

_Feb, 2030—_

        Later that night, after checking into a sullied motel room—after the lights in the hall went out; after Lecter’s words had just settled in her ears, resounded there, and his smile melted into black; after the chair she sat in toppled to the ground as she jolt from it and she blindly ran down the hallway, shoe heels pounding on the cement floor sharply;

        After screams and laughs and hisses from the other inmates followed her out, urging her to stop, urging her to “Stay awhile!”; after rushing into the small space of the dark elevator and took it up (up out of the dark, out of hell;) after she’d hurriedly retrieved her gun and bustled out of the hospital before Chilton or Barney could say a word—

         Clarice dreamed of blood.

        It dripped noiselessly onto strands of hay, seeped in between the crunchy yellow blades, staining them. The smell of dew and earth mixed with the blood’s metallic tang. It collected under the piles and slowly grew out in burgundy pools. Clarice watched it as it edged forward towards her feet. At the last moment, she shifted her weight, sidestepping the rim of red that slid on across the ground.

        Around her, muted bleats called from some place dark. They came in pairs (one scream, one more, following each other) while others resounded in lonely echoes. She looked for them, turning her head from one side to another. One last bleat, the loudest of them all, came from behind her, making her jump.

        Slowly, Clarice turned her gaze over the line of her shoulder and stared.

        There, lying limply, the body of a small lamb rested, its thin neck sliced open. Blood gushed from the cut skin, merging with the gore that already layered the ground. Its lifeless eyes looked up at her, a moistness encircled around its dim pupils. And through its parted muzzle, passed and exposed grey tongue, the lamb gurgled (sighed) and spoke in a voice that held a familiarity: “ _Any day now_.”

        Clarice’s jaw went slack as tears welled in her eyes.

        “ _Any day now_.”

 

<><><>

 

        Inside the Reading Psychiatric Institute, Clarice gripped the edges of her purse sitting in her lap, fingers rattling inside her gloves as she pulled and cracked their bones. Around her, a sterile, antiseptic smell hovered along the air, mixing discordantly with the faint scent of heated dust project from the industrial sized heater structured to the ceiling. It hummed and clanged as its fans whirled away, steadily warming any of the frigid outside chill that still clung to her skin.

         A gather of sweat covered the back of her neck and soaked into the collar. Carefully ( _cautiously_ ) she stole a glance at the mounted camera that hung on the wall behind her. It was nothing as advanced as Chilton’s (simple, slightly outdated) yet its black lens buried itself into her skin, watched her, saw her.

        Looking back, she was greeted by her reflection, its shape trapped in the surface of the Plexiglas wall that divided the room. Clarice eyed it and noted just how haggard she looked. Shadows lined the lids of her eyes and the creases etched in her brow were more prominent than ever. Under her skull, a headache pulsed and pounded. Shutting her eyes, Clarice lightly touched the pads of her fingers to tired skin.

        Earlier that morning, after waking from a restless sleep, Clarice had decided, based on the little time and preparation she had to work with, on a relatively poor plan of posing as Graham’s attorney of record. The idea was senseless and in the back of her mind, Clarice was almost certain it would not work. But the sheer will that had pushed her this far was still beating under her skin, making her brain go numb and her judgment dry up into dust.

        From what she remembered during her generals, regards to most institutions, visitations were set approximately a week or more in advanced. The chances of entry without an appointment was near to none, unless you were in connection with one of the registered patients and/or inmates; even better, if you are related to them legally.

        The rest of her morning had gone by in a blur: she drove nonstop from Baltimore to Reading till she reached the institute. There, she somehow convinced the young, easily flustered receptionist that yes, she was Mr. Graham’s representative and that it was bad bookkeeping to blame for her visit not being listed in the registry. She also assured her that, for the sake of her job, the mix-up was better left unsaid to the institute’s directorial head, an idea the poor, close-to-tears woman agreed with wholeheartedly.

        A guard had escorted her then, down into a long stretch of white hallway and into the room she now sat in. “Just wait here,” he’d said, and soundlessly shut the door, leaving her alone with her rampant nerves.

        Inhaling deeply, Clarice adjusted in her seat, moving her purse from her lap and onto the tabletop. She was restless, but not from the anxiety she _should_ be feeling; oddly, she felt no worry over being caught nor did she care. All she cared about was getting back to Lecter, getting back to the case and finally getting the answers she set out to find. This side venture was a waste of time, just an errand, pointless and—

        Without warning, the door behind the Plexiglas wall jerked open. Clarice’s eyes snapped wide and she watched as a pair of guards walked in. Each one moved to a corner of the room, the keys around their belts rattling, their occupied holsters swaying, and waited with legs spread and hands held in the front. Neither spoke nor looked at her, their silence layering thickly in the air. From the outside hall, a rolling sound came (steady in speed, getting closer, louder) followed by the tap of footsteps.

        And before she could blink, Clarice was sitting face to face with Will Graham.

        A third guard wheeled him in, sliding him up close to the divider till the tips of his feet touched its glass. He was covered head to toe in an assortment of straps and restraints, all tying him to the wheelchair he sat in. Fastens were cinched around his wrists, forearms, and biceps, structuring the line from shoulders to fingertips to the arms of the chair. Identical straps tied his thighs, shins, and ankles still, while a large band stretched across the plane of his chest, snug under the armpits. A belt with a Velcro lining was wrapped around his hips and a clipped on strap pulled up between his legs and over his groin.

        Fixed around the curve of his brow, a padded restraint held the back of his head flush with the chair, raising his sharp jaw up and his chin out, straight-necked, immobilized. Lastly, a shining, clear plastic mouth guard curved along the dips of his cheekbones, the top of a scar, the bridge of his nose, and covered the same full lips Clarice had seen sketched out in the dim light of Lecter’s cell.

        The guard still holding the handles of Graham’s seat bent down then, fingers moving to the brakes of the chair’s wheels and flipping them down. Silently, Graham’s eyes followed him, studying the guard’s face with a dark (starved) look. Giving the locks a final shake, the guard stood straight and walked around to the back of the wheelchair. Sliding his fingers down the space behind Graham’s head, he tugged at the plastic mask’s straps, tightening it along the clean skin of the man’s face.

        With that, he turned and exited the room, Graham’s eyes still pinned to him. The other two guards trailed after, the last one out shutting the door tightly, locking it soundly.

        Graham’s eyes hung on the closed door for a long pause before slowly turning forward, their dark pupils latching onto Clarice’s face. They held a sharpness to them, one that glinted and tore through the space between them, exposed it, ate it up. His position was the same as in his picture, They stared at each other (quietly, intently.) before Graham opened his mouth, the heat from his breath fogging the plastic of his mask—

        “They told me my attorney needed to speak with me.” His voice was light, soft, and deceivingly normal. “Funny thing is...I don’t have one.”

        Clarice let the tip of her tongue swipe her bottom lip and nodded, “Yes, uh, Mr. Graham,” she paused to pluck her badge out of her purse and press it against the glass. She pulled it away after Graham eyed it. “My name is Clarice Starling, with the FBI.”

        Under the mask, a crooked smirk grew across Graham’s face. It reached his eyes, crinkling the smooth skin around them, yet seemed...mordant. “But you’re not actually, are you?” he asked.

        Clarice frowned, “I'm sorry?” A heavy feeling of déjà vu sloshed around Clarice. In the back of her mind, it felt like she was trapped once again in the damp hallway back at Baltimore State, like she was going over the same words that had been shared with Lecter; the same manipulative game where he lead the way with spontaneous and bizarre comments while she followed along blindly.

        Graham gave a light sniff and pushed up against his restraints. “Oh, I’ve seen every magic trick the FBI can pull out of their hats. Your trick happens to consist of an officer—I'm _guessing_ officer. You’re so young and that badge expires in a matter of days—lying about who she is and essentially breaking the law to come talk to me, someone whom no one has talked to in years.” Another push against the strap across his torso, slim chest rising in a breath to rub against the polyester. “If the FBI really wanted to chat, well, no magic needed. But here you are, flying solo. So, no, you’re not with the FBI. Right now, this is you with someone else…”

        He paused and cocked an eyebrow, his smile growing a fraction as he pried, “So who are you with, officer?”

        At this, Clarice sighed. The same irritation she had felt with Lecter was stirring in Clarice’s stomach. It was almost comical how alike the two were—how similar their gaze felt against her skin, their uncanny ability to spot truths under lies, the discomforting politeness each of their words possessed.

        A marriage of true minds, she thought. Unruly minds.

        As plainly as she could, Clarice finally said, “Your husband.”

        The smile playing on Graham’s lips promptly fell away, leaving them parted. After a pause, he asked, the question coming out small, “Why?”

        “He’s currently aiding in an investigation and—”

        Clarice bit her tongue as Graham’s voice shadowed hers, “Did you bartered with him?”

        “What makes you say that?”

        Graham scoffed lightly, “The FBI loves bartering,” followed with by a chuckle, “then again, so does Hannibal. But, he’s the one consulting, not me. Why go through all the trouble of being here if not to uphold whatever kind of deal you’ve concocted with him?”

        “He asked me to check up on you, actually.”

        “Ah—” a faint, distant look came over Graham’s face, one that made his features look younger, softer. A mixture of vulnerability and tenderness fogged his eyes; a naked expression that made Clarice glanced to the side as bashfulness fell over her. He stayed quiet for a moment before sighing and shutting his eyes. “We’ve never been good with estrangement. Separation is-is akin to suffocation for the two of us, like a feeling of…lifelessness.”

        There was an awkward beat where Clarice struggled for a response. “I thought…separation is supposed to make the heart grow fonder, not kill it?"

        Graham’s brow furrowed slightly, his whole face scrunching up. “Even if a chicken continues to move after being decapitated, it’s no less dead.”

        Clarice nodded and mentally added ‘melodramatic’ to the list of similarities the couple shared. She went along, “So, which one of you is the body and which the head?”

        “That’s not how a singularity works,” Graham said, eyes fluttering, shoulders sagging slightly, exasperated, as if he had repeated himself time and time again. “There are no pieces. Everything is conjoined-we are conjoined.”

        “I see…” Clarice nodded, excepting the fact without further thought. “Dr. Lecter seemed to feel the same way.”

        Graham hummed then shot a look at her purse on the tabletop. He blinked at it, smiled, “So, what’s the case? The one Hannibal accepted to play with?”

        Clarice frowned and slowly pulled her purse off the table and back into her lap, patting down the edges of the casefile inside it. “I can’t disclose that.”

        “Oh, sure you can,” Graham huffed. “You’ve come this far, what’s another breech in protocol?”

        Clarice waited a moment, then, simply, tiredly, “Buffalo Bill.”

        A knowing hum came from the cords of Graham’s throat. “The Virginia cowboy with a flair for flaying.”

        “Right up your alley, I suppose.” Clarice felt her stomach churn as the points of Graham’s teeth flashed under a smile. She ran a hand down the back of her head, fingers weaving through hair, then added, “He—Dr. Lecter—uh, also wanted to apologize.” Graham gave her a confused look. “For causing your incarceration.”

        Here, Graham let out a laugh, its short, airy sound catching behind the shield of his mask. If he could, he would have shaken his head. “Unbelie- _he_ didn’t cause it. No one _caused_ it. Domesticity made us sloppy. Our walls were down when the tide came in. We couldn’t get away, not both of us.” A pause as another bitter tasting laugh escaped him. “Hannibal gave himself up so I could run. He didn’t want me to-didn’t want us both to…”

        Clarice watched Graham stop and bat his eyes at the space above her head. The lines in his skin that had remained invisible finally came to view, cutting around his mouth and brow, making him look worn and wrung out. He continued, voice hitching, “Nothing was his fault and I wasn’t caught—I simply stopped running.”

        This time, Clarice was the one to ask, “Why?”

        Graham opened his mouth, lips already forming words, then stop. His eyes skirted to the side, towards the door, further even, head instinctively following yet jamming in the restraint around his brow. He stayed still, listened to…something passed the quiet of the room, something Clarice tried and failed to hear. And just as soon as he looked away, Graham turned back. “Thank you,” he said, voice now laced with an urgent energy, “for coming here. It’s been…enlightening.”

        Clarice felt the hairs on the back of her neck go up, the sudden exigency in the air making her heart rate spike. “What are you—”

        “Tell Hannibal I miss him,” he cut in, voice low and warm. “Tell him I need him. Please.”

        Clarice’s felt the bottom of her stomach drop out as a startling noise echoed through the space. The door on Graham’s side of the room slammed open and the two guards from earlier stormed in. Clarice watched them hurriedly move towards Graham and begin unlocking his chair. Quickly, she stood from her seat and beat a hand on the glass divider. “Excuse me! I'm not done talking to my client!”

        Another, identically jarring slam came from the side. Air from the hall rushed in as the door near her was swung wide followed by a broad chested guard and a squat looking woman clad in a black suit and thin glasses; the ID around her neck read _Directorial Head_.

        “Oh, yes you are! Who the hell are you?” she snarled at Clarice as she walked fully into the room, bustling close to her so they stood nose to nose. She pointed a long nail towards Graham, its manicured point aimed at his chest. “Get him the fuck out of here!” She turned the claw to Clarice. “And her too!”

        “Wait—” Clarice bunched her shoulders as the guard gripped her upper arm and began pulling her towards the door.

        “Goodbye, officer.” She could hear Graham’s voice over the bustle of activity.

        Dazed, Clarice watched as the two guards roughly yanked Graham away from the glass, the rubber of the chair's wheels squealing against the floor as they went. His eyes (still sharp, still _urgent_ ) stayed with hers until he was pushed out into the hallway and out of sight.


	10. Moscato

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Do you remember the last time anyone messed with Hannibal?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Firstly, I hope everyone had a wonderful, excellent holiday! My New Year resolution is to speed up my updates and finish this thing! So here's chapter 10, slightly fillery but the next one should be longer. Thank you to everyone still following, commenting, and leaving kudos. I love you all too much to say.  
> Beta: the flawless kaysaravia1  
> (Rated M for some language)

        When Alexander was born, he was preterm. (“Just shy of thirty-two weeks.” Her doctor’s voice still hovered near the back of her mind.) He was small, thin, and his fresh pink skin had been translucent and veiny. The weight marked down on his birth certificate had been a meager two and a half pounds, his length, twelve inches.

  
        It had been a jarring experience. Shortly after delivery, Alexander was hurried away by a set of gloved hands and swift feet. Instead of being placed into Alana’s waiting arms, he was given to an incubator. Then, it had all been so quick, too quick, and Alana had wept into the arms Margot wrapped around her, body and mind limp, numb, horridly exhausted.

  
        For more than two weeks, the two of them (the _three_ of them) inhabited the hospital. She and Margot slept bedside in Alexander’s room every night and ate there for every meal. Once and awhile, they would ghost back to their home for a wash and change. “He’ll be fine, but…still…” Margot had said one night, fingers running through Alana’s hair, comforting her body to her own as they sat together on a borrowed hospital cot. Across from them, their child laid on his back (still small, still thin) under the warm light of the NICU.

  
        “I know,” Alana responded. She’d stayed seated for a beat more then slid away and pulled a chair up close to Alexander’s side; her face hung close enough to the incubator’s plastic sides that her breath had fogged it. She’d listened to the light breathe that followed each up and down of the baby’s chest, before slowly, gently, slipping her fingers through the plastic holes.

  
        Her fingertips hovered over her son’s soft cheeks—his nose, lips, the fragile lines of his undersized ribs—and in her head, she swore:

  
        “I’ll always be there for you…I’ll keep you safe, protect you… from anything ( _everything_.)”

  
        And from that day on, that is exactly what she did. Alana kept him safe, she kept them all safe, and continued to do so. Even now, as the cab she sat in bounced over the speed bumps marking the entrance of the Baltimore State Hospital, the sound of gravel sliding and crunching under spinning tires echoing around her, she was keeping them safe.

  
        The tall bulk of the hospital blocked out the cloudy sun as the cab rolled to a stop next to the front doors. Alana took a moment to shuffle through her purse and pay the driver before stepping out. Chilled air fluttered over her exposed jaw, making her shoulders bunch up and the collar of her coat tickle the top of her neck. She waited, watched, as the cab drove silently away then began up the building’s steps.

  
        Her trip to Baltimore had been short yet odd as in the course of nearly fifteen years she had not once traveled back to the States. (Truthfully, she had not traveled anywhere outside of Ontario until the news broke of Hannibal and Will’s arrest, and even then, a short stay at a Whitehorse ski lodge would hardly counted.) But the stagnation that had unknowingly formed around her broke the night Jack called. Alana had barely given it a second thought before she was boarding a plane, bags packed, and nerves set.

  
        She knew she couldn’t idle (even though her senses told her to stay put, _stay away_.) She needed to get ahead of this, ahead of the storm that was slowly stirring.

  
        In the lobby, the click of her heels mixed with the almost inaudible whirl from the camera heads scattered around the ceiling. Alana noted each black dome as she made her way over to the small receptionist desk in the middle of the room. Stopping in front of it, she smiled down at man sitting there. “Hello, Barney.”

  
        Looking up from the magazine in his hands, Barney paused. “Dr. Bloom?” The surprise on the man’s face played out into a warm grin, the wrinkles around his eyes and nose creasing deeply. “I didn’t know we were expecting you today!” He stood from his seat, rounded the side of his desk, and stopped in front of Alana at a professional distance (not too close, not too far, a decent description of their relationship.) “How have you been? I haven’t seen you in years!”

  
        Alana hummed and swung the weight of her purse absently by the side of her leg. “I'm very-I'm good.”

  
        Barney clapped his hands together lightly, “Well, that’s good!” A pause, as he adjusted the hat on his head, then, “So, what can I help you with?”

  
        “I'm actually here for your boss,” Alana said. Above her, the cameras whirred. “Is he in?”

  
        Barney nodded, “Oh, yes, Dr. Chilton’s in his office,” and gestured towards the glass partition near the side of the lobby.

  
        Another hum. “Good.” Alana gave Barney one last smile before walking towards the partition.

  
        “Well, um, Dr. Bloom—”

  
        Barney’s voice rose up behind her only to fall as she added, “I know the way.”

  
        Through the glass divider, Alana cut across an empty sitting room towards the furthest side of the room. There, a stained-wood door took up half of the wall; the name on the plaque there (oversized and elaborate) made her eyes roll. Without knocking, she pushed opened the door and stepped inside—

  
        And froze on the spot.

  
        Behind the hulking body of his desk, Frederick sat in a white undershirt and a pair of black briefs, suit pant, tie, and grey button-down all folded neatly over the back of his chair. His bare arms and legs glistened slightly under the lights that filtered in through the windows, each scar and patch of faux skin highlighted, making him look almost plastic. He held his face away from the doorway, eyes cast down, Alana’s presence going unnoticed as he continued to slowly rub his hands up and down his exposed thighs.

  
        A small container rested on the desktop near his elbow. Its lid was propped halfway off, revealing the top swirl of a creamy odorless lotion. Frederick carried a hand away from his thigh and dipped it into the lotion. Scooping a generous amount onto the ends of his fingers, he moved to the round of his right shoulder.

  
        Fingertips gently dabbed the lotion onto mended skin, up and down. White blots soon lined the length of his arms like markers against a runway. Flattening his hand, Frederick swiped it once (once more) over his arm, polishing the lotion into an even sheen.

  
        Alana watched as Frederick repeated this action on his other arm (lotion, _pat-pat-pat_ , palm rubbing spots into skin,) the appalment she originally felt slowly fading away, empathy filling in the gaps. They both had scars, some physical, noticeable, some abstract, psychological, and they all came from the same place, the same past. They’d both been broken and burned and yet, here they stood—still living. In this way, she could overlook everything between the two of them. In this way, they could relate.

  
        With a small sigh, Frederick turned in his seat, hand reaching for another dollop of salve, and their eyes locked. He stilled, briefly, face blank, before fake lips split around an equally fake grin.

  
        “Alana Bloom,” he said, rising from his seat and giving Alana an even more unrestricted look at his scantly covered body. “What a…delight it is to see you.”

  
        Unsurprisingly, any (all) of the compassion Alana had felt for the man flew out the window. She braced her teeth against each other and managed a tight lip smile, “Hello Frederick.”

  
        Another (artificially sweet) grin and Frederick picked up the lotion from the table. Twisting on its cap, he dropped the lotion into a desk draw before with a thump; shut the drawer with a slam. “For the chaffing,” he said. “My skin’s terribly sensitive these days.” Reaching around, he gathered up the pant that hung off his chair and held it up, the belt still snaked through the pant loops swaying through the air, silver buckle clanking against itself. “Let me make myself presentable, yes?”

  
        Alana nodded and allowed her eyes to wander as the other began to dress. She looked to the door as she shut it softly, hovered on a framed collection of book sleeves taken from Frederick’s bestsellers ( _Hannibal the Cannibal©: Through the Mind of a Madman—Maryland’s Murders—Mental Illness and the FBI_ ) then to the ground as she walked fully into the room. Shrugging off her coat, she took a seat in one of the red leather chairs facing the desk. She placed her purse on the floor, kicked up her leg and draped it over the other, then sat back, straight.

  
        Across from her, Frederick was shoving the last ends of his shirt down the open waist of his pants. He zipped and began cinching up the belt. Finally, he whipped the tie off its perch on his chair. He sat in turn with a sniff, fingers guiding the silk around the curve of his neck and popped collar. “So,” he spoke, voice slow and unhurried, “what do I own the pleasure?

  
        Alana sighed and chose her words: “I hear you’ve been pimping out one of your patients, and a very unsuitable one at that.”

  
        Frederick’s fingers touched at the loose knot he’d made with his tie before tugging it soundly, forming a neat square close to his neck. An air of innocence had quickly formed around him. He shrugged, eyes squinted. “I'm not quite sure I know what we’re talking about.”

  
        “Who,” Alana corrected, “and we're talking about Hannibal.”

  
        (Just as quickly,) The airs vanished as a more serious look overtook Frederick’s features. “…Are we, now?”

  
        Alana continued. “Why is the FBI speaking with him?” A pause, a scoff. “Actually, scratch that. I do know why—you’re letting them.”

  
        “Mmm…” A hum echoed from Frederick’s throat as he braced his elbows on the desktop, fingers intertwining under his chin like a support. “You’re absolutely right. I am. It’s no big secret, Dr. Bloom. He’s consulting with them over, well, the particulars escape me. Murder, most likely.”

  
        Alana felt her brow furrow at how nonchalant the conversation was going. Nothing here was insignificant; the importance of it was almost palpable. “And why is he even eligible to consult? Hannibal’s been on watch ever since he was moved here, he shouldn’t be allowed to.” She stopped as something clicked behind her eyes. She tipped her head, a knowing sound rolling off her tongue. “How much are they paying you?”

  
        Frederick blinked his drooped eyes in a quick succession of threes (one, two, three, repeat.) Then, slowly, “The… _institution_ might, by the end of the season, receive a substantial donation from an anonymous donor. Other than that, there’s no money involved.”

  
        A mix of irritation and anger burned down the lining of Alana’s stomach. His ignorance was a danger, to himself, to others. (And who better to know that than the woman who had been blind for so long. Blind and not brave…)

  
        “Do you think this is a game, Frederick?” she finally snapped. “A chance for you to conjure up another shitty book idea? To take your precious psychopath out one more time? This is a catastrophe waiting to happen. Do you remember the last time anyone messed with Hannibal?”

  
     “Oh, everyone remembers,” Frederick snorted, a bitter sneer inching up the side of his nose. His hands dropped from under his chin and gripped into fists, the scared skin there straining against the bumps of his knuckles. “ _That_ was a catastrophe—lives lost, two murders let lose to gallivant off to God-knows-where, and the FBI left with their thumbs still stuck up their asses.”

  
        Turning abruptly, he rolled his seat to the side till he faced his computer. He tapped a number of keys, each click jolted and loud as he smashed his fingers down. A beat, shorter even, and then he rotated the screen so its electronic glow glared in Alana’s eyes.

  
        She stared closely at the single feed playing on the screen and swallowed. In it, a downwards view of Hannibal could be seen; he drew quietly at a desk against his cell, back towards the camera, shoulders straight and straining against the fabric of his jumpsuit. In his hand, a pencil ebbed and flowed against the sheet of paper in front of him, graphite gliding out with skilled strokes. Every so often, he’d pause, clear the page of invisible specks with the side of his pinky, and continue on scribbling.

  
        It was comical ( _humorlessly_ comical) at how untouched and unchanged Hannibal looked. His body was still built and sturdy, greying (only somewhat) hair fell in the same manner around his cut face, the energy that simmered off of him was as fresh as it had been all those years ago even from behind a camera lens. It was like the cage he sat in had preserved him somehow, made him ageless.

  
        “Unlike your people,” Frederick said, drawing Alana’s attention, “I'm not about to let him go dive-bomb off a cliff anytime soon.”

  
        “That doesn’t mean anything, Frederick, and you know it,” Alana bit out, shoving the edge of the computer screen back into a lopsided slant. “Locked up or not, Hannibal needs to be left alone, not paraded around.”

  
        Something hot and dark and testing crawled along the lines of Frederick’s face. He glared at Alana as he gingerly straightened out the screen, then, “That maybe your opinion, Dr. Bloom—that maybe everyone’s opinion—but this is my hospital and Dr. Lecter is my patient, and as long as there is, what should we call it, profit, coming from this, then the FBI can march their little feet in here whenever they please.” He leaned back in his chair once more, hands clasping over the top of his stomach. He shook his head, “Besides, this has nothing to do with you. It transcends you.”

  
        Alana forced her clamped teeth apart and hissed, warned, “Frederick—”

  
        The words on her tongue dried up as the door behind her slammed open. Turning her chin over her shoulder, she stared—a woman, young, small, stood awkwardly in the middle of the doorway. Frizzed strands of brown hair hung around her curved face, framing a pair of thin lips and wide, analytical eyes. She returned Alana’s stare for a moment, batted her eyes, then looked over at Frederick. “I'm, uh…” she swallowed audibly. “Pardon me. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

  
        “Officer Starling,” he said, shadowed look dissolving into his default grin. “We were just talking about you.” Officer? Alana felt her jaw slack. Frederick continued, “This conversation was over anyway.”

  
        Starling nodded and walked fully into the room, stopping behind the other empty leather chair. She tugged at the purse strap hanging from her shoulder and parted her lips. Oddly, Alana knew what she was going to say next: “I need to speak with Dr. Lecter.”


	11. Frascati

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “He’s wearing them.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 11! Hopefully, everything after this will roll out a little faster~ Thank you to everyone still following, commenting, and leaving kudos. You guys rock:")  
> Beta: the perfect kaysaravia1  
> (Rated M for some mature content)

        “I need to speak with Dr. Lecter.”

  
        Clarice’s voice hung in the air, thin, low, and broke apart around the silence that met it. Both Chilton and his guest—an older women with a large, intimidating presence, and white skin that viewed bleached against the deep red pantsuit covering her body—were watching her closely, their eyes bright and relentlessly observing. She stood awkwardly with her fingers touching the back of the chair she stood behind.

  
        After a lengthy beat, the guest cleared her throat and stood. Clarice’s brow tightened as the other glanced her up and down then held out a slender hand. They met palms, shook briskly, then, “Officer Starling. Alana Bloom. I'm sorry, but Hannibal Lecter is no longer suitable for visitation.”

  
        Clarice felt her mouth slowly fall open. For a moment, all she could do was blink. A joke, she thought. But as she studied “Bloom’s” face, the serious look there stirred a sharp, sinking feeling down in the pit of her stomach. She turned to Chilton, a mindless attempt to get…(help, reassurance?) something, only for him to play the spectator and lean away in his chair, small smirk present.

  
        She returned to the stone-like stare Bloom lent. “Uh, Dr. Lecter is consulting with the FBI on a very important investigation.” It felt strange explaining herself.

  
        “Wonderful,” Bloom smiled tight-lip and cocked her head, bobbed hair swinging to the side, “but not anymore. His consultation was agreed upon illicitly. The only way you’ve been able to speak with him was because of the bribes your team’s been passing under the table.” She paused and spoke this time to Chilton. “You’re lucky I don’t turn you _both_ in.”

  
        Chilton’s smirk grew a touch wider and he shrugged. “Tricky thing to do when the government is the partner in crime.”

  
        By this time, Clarice’s head was spinning. She could feel her time fading, like a constant dripping that coated its way down her back and shoulders. Her hands clench around the photos tight enough to crease them as she pushed away the surprising (not quite surprising,) news about the bureau.

  
        She edged out, “Ms.—”

  
        Bloom corrected her tartly, “Dr.”

  
        “—um, _Dr._ Bloom. Dr. Lecter’s help could be the only way for us to solve this investigation.”

  
        She waited for a response, waited for the charade to end so she could get back to work, yet none came. Stubbornness seeped out of Bloom in waves, causing a hot flush to spread over Clarice’s cheeks. A rushed feeling swamped around her as she stole a glance at the clock resting on a shelf behind Chilton’s head. More, precious time. After all she’d done, she was still left at a standstill.

  
        Frowning, Clarice moved closer to Chilton’s desk and slammed her purse down on the tabletop. Chilton gave an irritated huff as she proceeded to dig through it and pulled out her casefile, it too landing on the wood with a _bang_. She flipped it open and skimmed through page after page of statements, crime scene documentations (typed and written,) and dossiers till she reached the collection of photos that hung paperclipped in the back.

  
        She swept them up and sorted each glossy image, one after another, before stopping on one of the more graphic stills of Buffalo Bill’s first victim: a woman, body bloated and water-worn, lain out naked on a pier dock near the bay she was found in. The photo was shot close enough so that the viewer could see the blue color her skin had taken on from the cold and the reddened eye socket the fishes had nibbled clean.

  
        Clarice stared down at the picture before turning it on Bloom, arm outstretched, frown still in place. She let the other take a (long) look before asking, “Have you heard of Buffalo Bill?”

  
        Bloom kept her mouth shut, her stoic expression still in place yet...weakened. Clarice held the photo for a beat more then reached for another: the third victim, face down, back exposed to show the long strip of skin that was carved off from her shoulders to backside, muck from the wharf she was pulled out of still clinging to her grey skin.

  
        She moved both photos to one hand as she grabbed another, and another, one more till the photos splayed out like fans in between her fingers. She shook them. “He’s killed five young women, so far. Each one died slowly and painfully. Dr. Lecter could help us keep that number from going up by giving us information on the man who is doing this. So, please, Dr. Bloom. I need to speak with him.”

  
        No one spoke then, the air quietly churning. Clarice watched as Bloom’s eyes flickered over the photos, demeanor falling, bit by bit, her elegant posture stooping forward slightly and thin lines appearing around her mouth and eyes. She gave an audible gulp before dropping her head to blink at the ground. Beside them, Chilton (smirk gone, face grim) stared on, fingers playing against the wood of his desk.

  
        Clarice paused to take a breath, to deflate, then lowered the photos to her sides. She let out a whisper, “Please. He won’t stop unless we catch him.”

  
        Bloom kept her head bowed. She skimmed the floor, lips clasped together as she popped her jaw.

  
        Finally, she lifted her head and spoke (sneered), “You don’t know Hannibal like I do. You think he’ll tell you anything?” Bloom took a step closer. “He will run you into the ground before you get so much as a peep out of him.”

  
        “No…” Clarice raised her chin higher in the air and stood firm under the scrutiny of Bloom’s stare. “No, he will…for me.”

  
        Bloom frowned, eyes narrowing. She stayed this way, then backed away from the close space they shared. “Really?”

  
        She hummed as she scanned the air around Clarice’s face. Turning abruptly, she leaned over the chair she’d left empty and gathered up her purse and coat. She held them snug to her chest and with a sigh, said, “Fine, but I'm going with you.”

  
        Before Clarice could respond, Bloom was sweeping passed her and walking from the room.

  
<><><>

  
        When Clarice looked inside Dr. Lecter’s cell, a feeling of indescribable relief (no, not relief…exhilaration?) flooded over her.

  
        He sat tucked up to the small desk near the side of his cell. His head was down, attention focused on the drawing his pencil scratched away at. He sat like this, quietly, before sniffing at the air. His eyes never left the paper as he spoke, “Hello, Alana.”

  
        Clarice shifted her eyes to the side. There, Bloom stood with her belongings still wrapped in her arms, a distasteful smile stretching out her painted lips. “Hannibal.” She bit out each letter.

  
        Lecter drew one last curve on the page (leaned back, regarded it, approved it,) and looked up. His gaze caught with Clarice’s briefly, taking her in fully, head to toe, with a skirt of his eyes, then turned to Bloom. Something old a dark was lurking under his voice: “This is quite a surprise, seeing you here, after all this time.”

  
        Bloom let out a small breath, smile stretching still, stiffly, fake. “The feeling is mutual.”

  
        Lecter’s lips curled at this. “ _La beauté n’a pas d’âge_. You have aged gracefully, Alana. You look just as you did during our last meeting,” he said, laying his pencil down flat so its length lined up with the edge of the table, symmetrical, clean. Standing from his chair, he pushed it in neatly then slipped his arms behind his back. He stepped the short distance between himself and the cell bars till his chest brushed against metal. “Do you remember it?” he whispered. “Where did you run to, after that day? Surely you did; packed up the family and scurried. Was it far?”

  
        The air around Bloom singed slightly, burned, yet her smile never fell. Clarice swayed away from her as more bit words came, “We’re not here to talk about that.”

  
        “Then why are you? I am abundantly curious to know.” Lecter cocked his head. “You are not still under Jack’s thumb are you?”

  
        “Fortunately, I'm not involved here.” Bloom took a moment, where she shifted her belongings to one hand and flicked at her draping hair with the other. “And it’s not Jack anymore. It hasn’t ben for a long time. I'm just here to make sure you behave yourself.”

  
        “Is that all?”

  
        Bloom hummed, “I also like seeing you locked up. It suits you.”

  
        “Unlike that new perfume of yours. Sadly, jasmine is not for you.” Lecter blinked slowly, face smug, as Bloom’s brow creased deeply, smile finally gone. His gaze stayed with her for a pause before he strolled to the side of the cell, feet positioning him in front of Clarice. Their eyes connected once more (automatically, magnetically, pulling her closer.) “Hello, Clarice.”

  
        Clarice straightened slightly at her name. “Hello, Dr. Lecter.”

  
        “Are you well?” he asked. “You seem frayed.”

  
        In her head, Clarice recounted the hours she had spent driving back and forth across state lines; the people she had met (whether willingly or not;) her frantic escape from Reading and the lies she had told to get there. It felt like a lifetime ago instead of its foggy 24 hours.

  
        She shrugged (counted one more lie,) “Only a bit.”

  
        Lecter raised an eyebrow. “Only?”

  
        Clarice let the air between them grow still then. Pulling her eyes away from Lecter’s draw, she turned her head to the side, towards the second to last cell: Migg’s cell. She had noted when they had walked in that the space was void of the stringy man she had met the previous day, the small room now inhabited by dark shadows. “Where's your friend?” she asked, eyes returning, centering.

  
        Lecter sighed, chin pointing to the side of his cell’s shared wall. “Yes. Different, isn't it, without him here? He tragically swallowed his tongue during one of our sessions late last night.”

  
        “Poor Miggs.” Clarice nodded absently, then, “I want to talk about Bill.”

  
        A rumbling hum escaped the line of Lecter’s throat. “I believe you have something to tell me before we begin, Clarice. Quid pro quo, remember? How was he?”

  
        To the side, Bloom tipped her head, frowning. Her eyes wandered through the air (perplexed, searching,) before a knowing light entered them. She turned to Clarice, mouth hung wide, the whites of her eyes vibrant against dilated pupils. She hissed, “You didn’t…”

  
        Clarice spared a sheepish glance before answering: “Mr. Graham is quite healthy and being treated with the upmost care.”

  
        At this, Bloom’s shoulders visibly slumped. She swiped a hand over her lips as a pained look washed over her. A mutter (“ _Oh, Christ’s sake._ ”) and her head shook as Lecter pressed his face closer to the bars. “I expect something more than that. Tell me more, Clarice.”

  
        Clarice swallowed, the sound of Bloom’s steaming murmurs tickling her ear. She chose her words carefully, yet they spilled from her tongue rushed and sloppy. “He knew who I was almost immediately, but-but didn’t know you had sent me. When I told him, he was…surprised. He wanted to know why. He also wanted to know about the case.”

  
        She paused to touch the tip of her tongue to the corner of her mouth. Lecter watched her closely, stare pressuring, body tense. A hand had escaped its place from behind his back and now clenched at one of the cell bars. She continued. “He didn’t seem to mind being imprisoned and he was polite, calm. Like you. Actually, he was _very_ like you. It was like I was here again, like we were still talking. He sees your similarities too, he can feel it, I think. He said your marriage was a singularity—”

  
        “ _Marriage?_ ”

  
        Clarice stopped as Bloom scoffed loudly. Her earlier tight lip smile was now full and bright. “Did he tell you that they’re married?”

  
        She turned and studied Clarice’s face before laughing sharply. She continued to speak, yet her eyes zigged to Lecter. “Did he also tell you that he and Will Graham’s marriage was under false names, therefore neither legal nor recognized.”

  
        Black eyes merged seamlessly with the shade of his brow as Lecter slowly dropped his head into the hard slope of his shoulders. The same heated look Clarice had seen during their first meeting peeked out. “None of that matters to us,” he said lowly, his body swaying lightly, agitated. A predator stance.

  
        “Oh, it does to the real world,” Bloom quipped. “And it sure as hell did when you tried to pull spousal testimonial privileges in court.” She took a stepped closer to the bars (too close, close enough for her to reach out and touch the lines of Lecter’s baleful face.) She held his stare unwavering even as the edge of his lip coiled, showing teeth. “Even you can’t transcend legalities, Hannibal. The whole delusional life you may have made with Will Graham is just that and nothing more.”

  
        After a moment, Lecter whisper, unnervingly quiet, “How is your son, Alana? He must be a strapping young man by now. Pity I have yet to meet him.”

  
         “And you never will.”

  
        “Never say never, Alana.”

  
        Bloom barely batted an eye at the veiled threat. She backed away to stand in her spot hovering just off Clarice’s shoulder, Lecter tracking each of her steps. She nodded to Clarice to continue, her input coming to a close.

  
        “Dr. Lecter,” Clarice said. His head swiveled back to her. “Tell me about Bill now. Please.”

  
        Lecter took a few breaths, the raging storm across his face dying slightly with each rise and fall of his chest. The shadows bearing down on his eyes dissolved finally, the rise of his lips flattened, and he morphed back into his usual composed manner with a final deep sigh. “I'm assuming you have ample time to study his murders. What do you think of them?” he said.

  
        A pause. “More to the point, what do you think of _him_. Why do you think Bill kills?”

  
        Clarice chewed the question over. (Disgusting, she thought. Vile, repulsive, despicable,) “He’s a sadist.”

  
        “That can be said of anyone,” Lecter shook his head once. He joined the hand that still sat tightened around the cell bars back behind his torso. “Let’s considered this: killing is a form of creating.”

  
        Clarice frowned. “Is it?”

  
        “Consider.” Lecter silenced her with a click of the tongue. “People leave traces of themselves in things they create; an unconscious projection of self. So, what has Bill left?”

  
        A list of every found evidence pulled up behind Clarice’s eyes. She read through it, pushed it away, pulled up the autopsy reports she could now recite by heart. She blinked when the room grew too noiseless. “His, um, trademark is the removed skin, normally in diamond or square shape. All of the bodies were also found with strangulation marks on their neck. One had debris in her throat, um, an insect—”

  
        Another click of the tongue, this time accompanied with a raised palm. “The papers have told me this all before, Clarice, and I didn’t ask for his “trademark.” Lecter spoke slower, “I asked what he left behind.”

  
        Clarice could feel the blood under her skin pump faster, flowing through her chest, up to her head. She wasn’t understanding, wasn’t grasping what Lecter held out for her, like a prize not yet won. She sighed, frustration building. “Nothing. He leaves no DNA, hair, semen—”

  
        “He does not touch them?”

  
        “No. There have been no signs of rape on any of the victims. Some were even virgins.”

  
        “So, he is not sexually attracted to these women, physically at least. Does this surprise you?”

  
        Clarice blinked, sniffed, “Yes, actually.”

  
        “But something must attract him,” Lecter said. He lifted his chin, “Tell me about the women he’s slain, Clarice. What were they like?”

  
        The reports returned and Clarice skimmed them quickly. “All young, early to mid-20s. All Caucasian, darker hair, um—”

  
        Lecter cut in, “What of their bodies? Where they overweight?”

  
        Here, Clarice stalled—information like that could not have been found in the papers—then realized that this is what she had been waiting for. No more playing games or unneeded banter. This was new feedback, new participation. This was Lecter finally consulting.

  
        “They were all heavy set, yes.”

  
        Lecter hummed. “Why this trait?”

  
        Clarice thought, “A fetish?”

  
        Lecter shook his head (wrong.) “We’ve already established that sexual desire is not involved.”

  
        “Fetishes aren't always sexual…” Clarice swallowed as Lecter left the statement unanswered. (Wrong again.) She thought once more, then added, after a beat, “Sizeism?

  
        Their gaze was broken as Lecter’s eyes fluttered shut. His shoulders sagged slightly and the curve of his brow pulled together in cuts and lines. “Oh, Clarice,” he sighed. His voice oozed with disappointment.

  
        There was a movement next to Clarice as Bloom shifted her weight from one leg to the other. Breaking her silence, she said, exasperatingly, “Speak, Hannibal, don’t play games.”

  
        Lecter gave the other a fixed stare. “Are you involved now, Alana? I would bite my tongue if not.” When Bloom’s response was a deflated huff and a mutter, he nodded, satisfied. Looking back, he said, “Bill is a transsexual, that is, he thinks he is. He wants to be. He wants to be many things.”

  
        Clarice frowned. “A person’s orientation doesn’t determine if they’ll become a serial killer or not.”

  
        Another flutter of the eyes. “Exactly, just how transsexuality has nothing to do with orientation. I’m sure Bill’s ways were spun by many years of systematic abuse and self-hatred of his own identity.”

  
        Clarice drew out her breath. “He wants to become a woman. He’s killing women out of jealousy.”

  
        “Only somewhat; mostly out of desperation,” Lecter added.

  
        “…I don’t understand.”

  
        Lecter’s head twitched to the side, a jolting, affronted half shake. “You do understand. You are just refusing to think.” He leaned closer towards the bars, towards her. “Think, Clarice. If an aspirant for sex reassignment displays substantial medical or mental health concerns, their application could be rejected.”

  
        “Bill was rejected.”

  
        A hum, “I suspect on multiple occasions. Because of this, he cannot become what he wants to become.”

  
        “A different…self?”

  
        “A _new_ self.” Lecter tilted his head then and again asked, “Now Clarice, do you have an answer as to why Bill kills?”

  
        Clarice felt her brow furrow. Lecter was coddling her now, she knew, she could feel it. He had told her the answer, he must have, and yet she still didn’t understand. The blood in her head began pumping harder, flowing faster down her neck and roaring in her ears, as she thought over everything she knew about the case. Letting her stare fall to her feet, she searched the polished tops of her leather shoes.

  
        And then it all clicked into place and she understood.

  
        “The skins…” Clarice whispered and the glints in Lecter’s eyes grew. “He’s wearing them.”

  
        A small, almost content sigh came from Lecter’s mouth as he smiled, lips splitting to show the shadow of his teeth. “Clever girl,” he breathed. The smile reached his eyes. “You are very close to figuring this out. All by yourself.”

  
        Slowly, genuinely, Clarice matched the smile. “Am I?”

  
         The clank of the elevator echoed through the air, breaking the quiet of the hall. The other inmates began their familiar calling, their fists beating at their cages. Clarice followed Bloom and the two both stared as the lift’s doors rattled then opened revealing its passenger.

  
         “Barney?” Clarice raised an eyebrow.

  
        Barney nodded. “Uh, Officer Starling, Dr. Bloom, I'm goin’ to need to escort the both of you out now.”

  
         Clarice frowned before rushing a glance at the clock on the wall ( _2:16_.) “We still have plenty of time before lights out.”

  
         “It’s…” Barney paused to adjust his hat. He shook his head awkwardly. “Dr. Chilton asked for it.”

  
        A moment, then Bloom looked back to Clarice. “I suppose it is time to go.” She looked to Lecter, and gave a bland, “Goodbye, Hannibal.” before turning on her heels and starting towards the elevator.

  
        Lecter watched her trek out of the corner of his eyes while Clarice gaped. “Wait—”  
“Officer Starling, I really need you to come with me,” Barney cut in, shifting to the side of the lift as Bloom boarded.

  
        Reluctantly, frustratingly, Clarice let her body sag with a sigh. She opened her mouth to say farewell, but the word caught. Instead, she added, “Um, your-Mr. Graham, he also told me that…it wasn’t your fault. The night you were caught. It wasn’t your fault.”

  
        Lecter stared at her for a long minute after, eyes blank, mouth parted a fraction. When he remained silent, Clarice dipped her head and took a step away (another, again until she was halfway down the hall.)

  
        “Clarice.”

  
        Clarice quickly strode back and faced Lecter once more. They shared a look before she glanced down at his hand. In it, the questionnaire from the previous day sat. “You forgot this,” he said, moving over to the metal drawer structured into the cell bars and placing the pages in the slot. He slid the compartment shut, the outside end popping out like a tray next to her.

  
         Gently, she plucked it up. Neat penciled words, circles, and marks dotted each page, every questioned answered in full. Reaching the last page, she flipped the questionnaire over. There, a detailed sketch of nude bodies filled the white surface. They were contorted and bent, all lying in different positions close to one another, all touching. Negative spaces filled in with darker graphite broke up the flow of arms and legs and stomachs and spines, black holes that contrasted the paleness of the figures.

  
        Looking closer, Clarice realized each piece, together, formed a skull.

 

<><><>

 

        Fredrick watched silently as Barney escorted Starling from the cell block’s hall. He rocked in his chair rhythmically. Pressed close to the side of his face, a phone hummed in his ear, the voice on the other end whispering softly.

  
        “Yes…yes, senator,” he answered into the phone’s receiver. “Absolutely. Anything we can do to help in recovering your daughter, we will do.”

  
        Reaching out with his free had, he tapped at his keyboard. The feed playing on his computer screen zoomed in until the downwards view of Hannibal Lecter, his head still turned in the direction his guest exited to. Frederick studied the other for a moment, phone still purring in his ear, chair still swaying, and smiled.

  
        “Yes, I'm sure we can come to some sort of agreement.”

 

* * *

P.S. the drawing Hannibae is hinting at is the wonderful [picture](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-UJ2ctXpD6PY/VDFpowxdUjI/AAAAAAAAYUA/GeDmRUoyukE/s1600/Dali%2B%26%2Bla%2Bt%C3%AAte%2Bde%2Bmort%2Ben%2Bfemmes.jpg) by Dali. I bet some of you will get what I'm trying to go for, but it will for sure pop up later on;)


	12. Lambrusco

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “See what happens when it misbehaves? See how it will hurt?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so, so sorry for this chapter's tardiness. I was neither mentally nor physically prepared for the onslaught of stupid that is collegework :'v But here's a little filler before classes this morning. A heartfelt and giant thank you to anyone who's still hanging on, commenting, and/or leaving kudos! You are all wonderfully wonderful.
> 
> Beta: the crazy perfect kaysaravia1  
> (Rated M: depictions of abuse, some language.)

        First, there was pain. (Muscles bunched, stiff and sore; nerves pinched and electrically hot; mind foggy, frighteningly numb.) Catherine felt it all cleft through her the second eyes parted and she slipped from unconsciousness.

  
        For a moment, she remained still, let her pupils dilate and adjust, and quietly processing the darkness that stared back at her. With a shutter, she took in a deep, deliberate breath. The bloom of lungs pressed against her sore chest and a groan escaped her as wet, decaying air filled them. Blinking, Catherine finally straightened from the odd position she lay in on the ground. Slowly (so slowly) she sat up, abdomen burning and shoulders hunched, joints popping and aligning.

        As she brought her head up, a new surf of pain halted the movement. “ _Fuck…_ ” Catherine hissed and grimaced and reached a shaking hand to the back of her head, to where it throbbed and ached, the peak of hurt. Hovering fingers dabbed the area of scalp, figuring a circle of tender skin. Pulling back, she stared down at her hand.

        Even in the dark, the blood there was visible.

  
        Catherine’s mouth trembled open as she rubbed her fingers together, coating them red, her shock lodging in her throat. She moved her hand further in front of her, examined it, then timidly brought it back to wipe at the fabric of her shirt—and yet, it wasn’t her shirt. Her clothes were gone (buttoned top, loose jeans, shoes, bra, panties) all replaced by a dirtied nightgown. Catherine blanched as she looked down the collar of the gown and glimpsed at her naked body, pale skin covered in grime and bruises.

  
        Hiding herself away under the gown once more, Catherine finally felt the fog around her mind part. Fear swept in, swiftly, joltingly, as lightbulb memories of the night before (Is it still night? she thought. Is it still that night or is it new?) flashed behind her stinging eyes: her car, music blaring, the weight of a plastic bag in the grip of her hand; the parking lot, covered by the night’s blanket of black, a crooked line of trees; a dog, white fur stark against the shadowed asphalt.

  
        A man, eyes dull.

  
        Catherine’s breaths came quicker then, the pain in her chest drowned by a flood of panic. A string of questions fired through her ( _Where am I? What’s going on? Why is this happening? What is happening?_ ) She casted her eyes around, up, and stopped to stare at the circular opening that hung above her.

  
        Yellow light created a muddy hallow around the curves of the hole and illuminated the edges of the high walls that surrounded her. Reaching out a hand, Catherine stretched out an arm until she touched solid surface. Its feeling was slick and damp and cold. Willing herself off her knees, off the ground, she stood and propped herself up against the wall. It towered over her (nearly 20 feet of jagged rock,) caged her in.

  
        For a beat, she stayed this way—body held upright by the side of the pit, ragged breath caught between her lips and stone, before frowning deeply. She was trapped (somewhere, nowhere) but she would not be helpless; she wouldn’t just sit. Seeing as she didn’t have a way nor the energy for scaling the walls, Catherine tilted her head back and did the only thing she could think to do: scream.

  
        “Help! Is anyone there? Help me!” She groaned as her voice reverberated against the hooked walls of the pit before fading into dead air. Beating the balls of her hands against the rock, wet slapping sounds echoing with each hit, she screamed again and again (voice spilling into the air, eyes squeezing together, brow furrowed, fists rhythmically pounding rock.)

  
        She bellowed out one more, “ _Help!_ ” and then Catherine froze as a face leaned into the opening of the pit.

  
        The man stared down at her, look shadowed just like it had been that night, eyes two lustered specks in the center of his stretched face. For a moment, he simply stared down at her, quietly, unnervingly, before pulling away from the opening. Catherine kept her gaze on the spot he’d left, body tense, petrified, not daring to move. A pause, maybe longer, and the man’s face returned. This time, he pushed a basket over the edge of the pit.

  
        It bumped and scraped against the walls as it was slowly lowered down, the rope tied to its handle snaking through the man’s hands and along the rock. When the basket hovered a few feet in front of her, Catherine peered inside it cautiously.

  
        There, a single bottle of lotion sat, plastic sides squeezed in and dented, its pop-lid covered in dried gel. Frowning, confused, Catherine looked back up at the man. His stare was unblinking and his voice was slow, “It takes the lotion out of the basket and rubs it on its skin.”

  
        “What…” Catherine felt her head shake back and forth as words finally bubbled out through her teeth. “Wait…wh-what are you doing to me? Why did you take me here? Who are you?” She moved closer to the pit’s walls, hands tugging at the thin gown that clung to her. “W-Where are my clothes?”

  
        She continued to speak, each question making the man’s darkened face take on lines. He scowled and shook the tethered basket impatiently, yet his voice was still slow. “It takes the lotion—”

  
        “Mister, listen!” Catherine shouted, their voices skipping over each other in a muddle. “You don’t have to do this—”

  
        “It takes—”

  
        “Where am I? Huh?”

  
        “—and rubs it on its skin. It must—”

  
         “ _No!_ No!” Catherine shouted and stomped her bare feet against the clammy floor. She beat at the wall once more before turning a hand to the basket that swung in the air, slapping it to the side so it slammed against rock, woven reeds snapping and crunching. She screamed again, “ _Answer me!_ Where am I? Where—”

  
        This time, the man’s voice boomed against the air, rough and ragged, a shout that shot spit across his lips and inflated the veins along his neck. “ _It takes the lotion out of the basket or it will get the hose!_ ”

  
        Catherine stared up at him, startled into muteness. She swallowed, throat raw, and finally tears broke. Streaks rolled down the rounds of her cheeks with a broken sob. Hands fisting, shaking in front of her, she cried, “What the _fuck_ are you talking about? Who the fuck are you?”

  
        There was a long beat where the man stayed quiet, his expression blank and emotionless to the sounds of her cries. He inhaled with a squeaking sniff then jerked away from the side of the opening once again, leaving her alone and the basket dangling. “ _Wait!_ ” Catherine yelled and paced after the man, skirting the bend of the pit. She cried harder. “Wait! Let me out of here! Get me out! Get me—”

  
        Here, the end of a metal spout flopped over the side of the pit, its black outlet glaring downwards like the muzzle of a gun. A small _clink_ followed soon after and Catherine was just quick enough to realize what was coming next.

  
        A jet of water hit onto the top of Catherine’s head in a blur, snapping it sideways throwing her off balance. Legs giving, she fell to the ground in a heap, the torrent of water following relentlessly after. Sharp, needle-pricks of pain hit her skin, its cold freezing her inside out and baring down on her body with an intensity. Gathering pools in her ear muffled the roaring sound raining around her. The rotten taste of the spray filled her still open mouth, ramming down her throat, gagging her screams.

        Thrashing and gurgling and straining against the weight of water pressing on her, she slid back across the floor till she hit a wall, now between uneven rocks and the killer deluge. She was drowning, suffocating, and just as her chest began to burn, lungs stifled, the water stopped.

  
        Shivers rippled up and down Catherine’s body, racking her. She blinked, dazed, at the ground, before hacking harshly. Watery bile rose to the back of her throat and dripped from the corners of her mouth onto her vibrating hand. Coughing again (head hung low so that drenched strands of hair veiled the sides of her face,) she managed to slide her knees up under her, pushing her up onto all fours. Catching her breath, composing the frayed nerves and pounding heart, she looked back up.

        The man was waiting for her. “See what happens when it misbehaves? See how it will hurt?” he hissed. He turns slightly and tugs the hose away from the pit’s edge then grabs at the basket’s rope. He snaps it like a whip, shaking the basket furiously through the air. Another hiss, “It takes the lotion, now. Now, right now.”

  
        He cracked the rope, swung the basket, once more, and Catherine snatched its side with a sopping hand. She held it still and shot the man a pleading look. She was met with a sour stare and a horrid scowl, not an ounce of humanity to be found. And she knew then, that he was going to kill her, that she was going to die. He was simply preparing her for it…

  
        Catherine pulled the basket closer to her chest and with a frail whimper reached for the lotion.


	13. Mourvedre

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Can you explain to me why an online crime tabloid thinks the FBI is consulting with Will Graham?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I realized by the end that there is a lot of yelling in this chapter (which might have been my subconscious yelling at me for taking so long to update:''v) But here, finally, is chapter 13!! Thank you guys so, so much for following and commenting/leaving kudos. It's such an honor to write for you!  
> (Rated M for some language)  
> Beta: the magnificent kaysaravia1

        Bloom had walked Clarice out after they were done with Lecter. She’d wrapped herself up in her long-coat and, for a moment, stood on the hospitals porch, staring down the snowy pathway. Her breath gathered around her in plumes, clouds that traced the air before dissolving into it. She’d whispered at one point, “You could have picked anyone to talk to…” before turning and meeting Clarice’s eyes, steady and hard.

        Clarice had nodded. “But we didn’t.”

        She had then asked Bloom what she was planning on doing, asked if she would remain “involved.” She’d answered with, “I'm going home, to my family.” They’d shaken hands then. Neither one of them said goodbye and Clarice had a feeling that their time together would forever be limited to the one day.

        Driving the mind-numbingly dreary stretch back to Quantico from Baltimore, Clarice arrived back at the academy shortly after 4. She parked and for a strange moment, she stayed motionless in the driver’s seat. She contemplated over the blur of event she had (incredibly) gotten through—over the fact that the pieces of the puzzle sat next to her, so close, in her purse, just begging to be put together.

        She had always had a linger doubt in the back of her mind, one that told her she had made a mistake (she was the mistake.) One that said she had taken all the wrong turns in life. But here, she finally felt the finality of everything she had done, ever since that first step she had taken away from her uncle’s farm.

        She finally knew all her turns had been right and they all lead her to this, to this case, to Lecter and Graham, to the break she’d been dreaming of.

        Stepping out, shutting the car door, locking it, Clarice made her way over to the academy’s front steps. Behind her eyes, she rehearsed how she would present Sesske with her findings. She was already imagining working side by side with official agents, helping them plug in the information and bringing Bill to justice once and for all.

        “Clarice!”

        Halting mid-step, thoughts scattering to the side, Clarice stared up the steps as Ardelia Mapp descended them. Initially, she smiled at the sight of her friend—they had known each other since their first day of orientation. They’d become close friends, in and outside of the academy, and were as much family to one another as non-related persons could be.

        The grin was short lived, however, as Clarice noted the seriousness of Ardelia’s look, her smooth brow pulled down in a frown. “Where have you been?” she asked as the two met in the middle of the steps.

        Clarice matched the others frown. “What? What’s wrong?”

        Shaking her head, sending her dark long ringlets of hair bobbing, Ardelia shrugged and said plainly, “There’s been another one.”

        And just like that, Clarice felt her heart drop.

        Inside the building, people (trainees, students, advisers) stood shoulder to shoulder, a compact crowd that filled up the foyer so as the walkways and exits were blocked off. A steady, quiet stream of murmurs drifted above their heads, collecting in the vacant air like rising smoke. Clarice looked on with frown for a moment, the backs of the mob held firm barrier in front of her, a wrangler that kept her pinned in the middle of the doorway; this lasted for a breath before Ardelia gripped her wrist and roughly cleared a path for them through the bodies.

        Jostled and slow, the crowd finally split, allowing them out in front of the foyer’s large TV. Clarice blinked harshly at the screen’s glow then focused on the pair of news anchors that sat behind a curved news desk. In the top right corner, the network had put up a boxed in college photo of a familiar looking young woman, yellow hair swept around her round face, smile big and eyes scrunched.

        Beside her, Ardelia swiped the remote from one of the crowd’s people who had managed to find a seat. She turned up the volume until it blared through the speakers, making them bounce. “Listen,” she whispered just as one of the anchors began his monologue:

        “Initially deemed as a missing person case, the disappearance of Catherine Martin is now believed to be in connection with the serial killer known by the media as "Buffalo Bill."

        The whispers behind Clarice grew louder, bolder. They crept across her shoulders and around her neck, making the hairs there stand on end. Without looking away from the screen, she asked to the air, voice scratchy, “When was this?”

        “Early yesterday morning,” Ardelia responded, chin dipping as she crossed her arms over her chest. “The pothead boyfriend called it in when she didn’t come back from the store.”                      

        The anchor continued, “A statement made by the Memphis Police previously this morning indicate that traces of blood and a torn blouse was found on the grounds outside of the missing person’s residence. As of now, no witnesses have been reported or have stepped up.”

        At this, the shot cut to the other anchor, a woman with golden earrings and equally golden skin. “We will now go live to a hearing taking place at the Tennessee State Capitol where Catherine Martin’s mother, U.S. Senator Ruth Martin, is currently speaking.”

        “Oh, _shit,_ ” Clarice hissed. That’s where she knew the young woman. She could remember watching Catherine, standing poised and smiling behind her mother during the Martin campaign run a few years back.

        Back on the screen, the newsroom had been replaced by a live view of the white steps of the Tennessee State Capitol Building. A blur of reporters with cameras, lens flares, and microphones were gathered at the base of the steps, all pointing upwards at the podium that had been set up. Behind it, a tall woman with a strong if not aged face stood ridged and commanding. She wore a red winter coat with a knotted scarf, hands clad in leather gloves that gripped at the sides of the podium. She stared down at the mass of people, the outside air picking up the sides of her hair and ballooning it out around her in grey and blonde strands, before clearing her throat.              

        “Catherine,” she spoke loudly and clearly into the mics in front of her, an echo following it, “my daughter, is 23 years old. She is a student at TSU. Catherine is a smart, kind, and gentle person. She is my only child.”

        Here, the Senator looked down as cameras flashed and whirled. There was a lengthy pause before she lifted her head again. This time, she stares directly at the main camera, directly at the viewers (directly at Clarice.) “To the person who is keeping my daughter, Catherine…you have the power to let her go, safely and unharmed. This is your chance to show the world that you can be a merciful and strong human being.”

        Clarice felt herself swallow back the dryness in her throat before exhaling through her mouth. Her body was tense, matching the overwhelming feeling of anxiousness that had crawled into the room. Everyone watched intently as the Senator casted a tongue over her tight lips and blinked watery, but firm eyes. “Please – for the sake of Catherine, my Catherine—I beg you to think this through.”

        She ended her speech with a hard, “Thank you.” then turned away, feet carrying her up the building’s concrete steps, a mangle of shouted questions, urges for a comment, and camera _clicks_ chasing after. The TV flickered back to the brightly lit newsroom and the two anchors. Now, the photo near the top of the screen showed the parking lot of a bleak looking apartment building.

        A voice over of the female anchor played. “Back in Memphis, at the South Bluffs Apartment Complex, which police have deemed the scene of the incident, the investigation continues. As of this afternoon, state and local authorities were joined by agents of the FBI—”

        Unhurriedly, a chunk of the crowd at Clarice’s back began to split and spill out from the room, taking the stifling heat from their huddled bodies with them. Pairs and groups of the younger masses all scurried towards their classrooms, all jittery with a tangible energy, all speaking in hushed whispers.

        _“Do you think this is a political statement...That poor girl…This is getting out of hand…This needs to be stopped…_ ”

        ( _This is all your fault…_ )

        Clarice hears the words circulate in her head and shuts her eyes against them. A throbbing headache is branching around her skull, nettling the skin of her scalp. Next to her, she can feel Ardelia stare at the side of her face, brown eyes characteristically sharp yet soft. Her hand grips onto her stiff shoulder after a moment.

        She gives it a shake, “I guess you’re case is prime time now, huh?”

        Sighing, Clarice leaned into the touch, body suddenly immensely tired, spirit wrung out. “I guess so.” Finally turning to her friend, she meets Ardelia gaze. A pause, then, quietly, “Is this getting…the better of me?” Clarice could feel her eyes begin to sting, but she blinks the frustrated tears away. “It feels like it.”

        A small smile grew across Ardelia’s lips. Her grip on the shoulder tightened as she said, “You’re going to get this. If anyone can, it’s gotta be you, girl.”

        Breathing deeply (in and out) Clarice let a weak grin break through. She rolled her shoulder out from under Ardelia’s hand lightheartedly and opened her mouth to speak. “The—”

        The jarring _slam_ of a door shoved open halted Clarice’s voice in the back of her throat. Everyone still lingering in the room all turned to watch as a base officer (uniform pressed against the bulk of his body, face drawn in serious lines) stalked into the middle of the foyer. He stopped to crane his head from side to side, eyes scanning the space carefully before locking with Clarice’s.

        “Starling!”

        The officer shot her name between his teeth like a bullet, making her seize up and her back straightened. And before she could respond, the officer tuned on his heels and left the way he came. “Follow!”

        Quickly, Clarice jogged after the officer, dashing by the withering glance Ardelia sent her and the on-looking stares. Under her chest, her heart pounded as she tagged along, following the lead out of the academic section of the building and up the stairs towards the second level workplace. She kept silent, head down and eyes to the backs of the officer’s feet. Not even a minute passed before she (regrettably) knew where they were going.

        Stopping outside of Agent-in-Charge Calvin Sesske’s door, the officer stood to the wall with his arms behind his back. Clarice looked at him timidly, his silence solidifying the severity of the situation she was about to walk in to. She paused, took a breath, swallowed, then opened the door.

<><><> 

        The office she stepped into was cold and quiet. The rows of square windows on the side wall were covered in cinched blinds and the florescent lights were murky from the plastic panel they shined through. Across from the door, Sesske sat leaned back in his chair, head sunk between shoulders and a fist to his chin. He was clicking the mouse of his computer, fingertip jabbing the pads soundly, roughly. He did this over and over (jab, _click,_ jab, _click_ ) not looking up, not speaking, leaving Clarice to shut the door noiselessly and stand tautly with her hands clenching her purse strap.

        Another jab, another _click_ , then, “Sit down.”

        Clarice obeyed, placing her purse on her knees. Everything was silent once more and the fraying nerves in her constricted stomach fluttering upwards into the cavities of her lungs. She waited for Sesske to speak again. He did:

        “Can you explain to me why an online crime tabloid thinks the FBI is consulting with Will Graham?”

        Every ounce of color drained from Clarice’s face as she blanched. “…What?” she managed, the flatness (the daftness) of the question making her bite down on her tongue.

        Sesske looked away from his computer at this. His eyes were dark, lips curled up in a sneer. “Or why they’re saying you were in fucking _Reading_?”

        Snapping back to the screen, he jammed a finger to the glass and read aloud. “And I quote, _An FBI agent was seen leaving the Reading Psychiatric Institute after being forcibly removed from what appeared to be a consultation meeting with known serial killer Will Graham…it is thought that the bureau may also be speaking with Graham’s associate, Dr. Hannibal Lecter_ —”

        Sesske’s voice rose in volume (its height breaking around Lecter’s name) before cutting off as he brought down the palm of his hand against the top of the wooden desk. He stood, face red, and turned his finger to point at Clarice. His small body shook as he yelled, “What were you doing in Reading, Starling? I told you Graham was not to be involved!”

        Stunned, sweat building across her forehead, Clarice shook her head automatically. She knew, obviously (or course she knew, she’d done it all. It was all true.) She knew why, but she didn’t know _how_. How had anyone known about her two day sprint across the borders and between hospital walls? Someone told, someone informed the media, she thought. For a moment, she drifted over a collection of faces in her head; the directorial head at Graham’s facility; Bloom; Barney… She stopped on Chilton and her blood boiled.

        Clarice shook her head with more vigor and began, “Sir, I—” yet Sesske’s voice roared over hers.

        “You’re done.”

        Clarice gave a faint, audible gasp. “Sir?” She blinked, “Sir, wait—”

        “ _No!_ ” Sesske snapped. “No. You deliberately disobeyed my orders, you got this case written all over some smut blog, and now a senator’s daughter is probably dead!” Another palm to table and he took a stuttered breath. “We had to publicly get involve because of this article—an article that _you_ made happen, Starling!”

        Clarice watched wide-eyed as the older man tucked his hands under his suit jacket and grabbed at his own hips, the growing stains under his arms now visible. He stood there, seething, then held out his reddened hand. “You’re done, god dammit. Give me your badge.”

        Hesitantly (hands now mimicking the shaking movement of her head) Clarice pulled her— _the_ badge out of her purse. Slowly, she placed it into Sesske’s waiting hand, blinking harshly as he snatched it away. She looked on quietly as he unpinned the gold badge from the leather bill and threw it unceremoniously into a drawer of his desk. As it hit (metal against wood,) its sound sent a sinking feeling through her.

        “Please, sir,” the words left her before she could stop them. “Let me-let me explain.”

        “What is there for you _to_ explain?” Sesske asked. He stared at her, hands back on his hips, sweat spots growing still. “You didn’t listen to me—”

        Frustration and anger and sadness and an overwhelming sense of desperation rose against the underside of Clarice’s clammy skin, every pent up emotion in her almost suffocating. “Sir,” she tried to keep an even tone, “please.”

        Sesske continued. “You have jeopardized this case—”

        “You can’t. Not now…”

        “You have made a fool of this department—

        “Don’t take me off the case!”

        Clarice’s voice echoed through the room, hammer-like and forcefully. She sat at the edge of her seat, breath caught, taken aback, and waiting.

         In front of her, Sesske stood, blinking quickly and tightly, confusion and irritation playing across his face. “You were never “on the case,” Starling,” he said after an endless beat. “Do you think you’re an agent?”

        The question stung and Clarice kept silent as Sesske slipped the paper ID with her face on it out of the plastic holder. He held it up and tore it in two with a flick of his wrists, a jagged line cutting right through Clarice’s name. He let the torn paper fall to floor. “This was nothing—this was a fill-in because you were there and I could spare you. You are not an agent, you are not on this case, and you are lucky that I'm even allowing you to stay here as a fucking trainee!”

        At this, Clarice could barely keep her head held. It dropped, their gaze breaking. She felt the burn of tears once again and furrowed her brow tightly, to the point of painfully, until they receded behind her lashes. Her cheeks flared, the skin there blistering pink with humiliation. She counted the breaths she took (one, two, reaching nine) before Sesske gave an exasperated sigh.

        “Did you at least get Lecter to fill out the questionnaire?” he asked.

        The outline of the casefile and the pages it held burned a hole through Clarice’s purse. She turned a glance to the opening flaps, stared into its inside. And suddenly, everything seemed calm as her verging tears vanished and she looked back at the fuming man across the table. The realization was clear and definite:

        She would do this by herself.

        Lifting her chin while moving a hand and zipping her purse shut, casefile and questionnaire hidden away, she said, plainly, “No.”

        Glaring darkly, Sesske looked away, dismissing her. “Get out of my office.”

        Clarice nodded, gave a curt “Sir.” then stood, purse tucked up under her arm. Wheeling around, she hurried out of the room before anymore could be said. Outside, the officer was still standing near the door. He did not follow as she raced by.

 


	14. Nebbiolo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “It’s our lead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jeeeez it's nice to be back!! Sorry for yet another delay:'( I started this chapter at the end of March but could only find time to work on it bit by bit since. But here we are finally, chapter 14! Again, sorry for the wait and sorry if this one seems a bit rushed through. So much thanks to anyone/everyone still hanging on, commenting, and leaving those lovely kudos. You guys make writing so much fun and worthwhile!

        Clarice stood with her head down, back straight, and feet planted in the center of a ring of papers. She scanned each page methodically, tracing each edge, each line of type, before moving to the next. When she reached a curve of the ring, heels pivoting, adjusting her view, and the scanning continued without pause.  In her hand, clenched by a fist that unconsciously shook, was the questionnaire.

        A haze had come over Clarice after Sesske had dismissed her (from his sight, from the case.) It covered her eyes red and buzzed in her ears, silencing any noise around her while internal thoughts raged on. She had bustled back to her room at the board house, warding off the concern of anyone who asked by soundlessly bypassing them; even Ardelia knew to stay away.

        Once in her room, door shut (loudly,) lock turned (tightly,) she ripped the casefile out of her bag and proceeded to dump its contents all along the carpeted floor. She’d arranged it all then, each sheet by in a chronological spread—information of the first murder at the top with the others following. A spot was made on the edge of her bed for the pile of crime scene photos and the two piercing mugshots of Lecter and Graham.

        From there, minutes to hours to the rest of the afternoon passed with Clarice examining all from her standing height. During, the only movement made from her fixed point was to bend down and flip through a stapled folio or rearrange the sequence of pages. At pauses, the aches of her legs and back or the growl of her stomach snagged her attention, yet it all went stubbornly unnoticed.

        She had to find it, whatever it was, whatever needed to be found. She could not stop. There is something in it all, something that hung right near the corner of her eyes that she could _just_ not see, something that breathed on the back of her neck and dared her to turn around.

        Lecter had said as much during their earlier meeting. He’d laid it all out for her, she knew, as straightforwardly as the man’s twisted and deceiving tongue could manage. The way he had urged her on, the way his eyes seemed to spark the more and more she began to put the jagged puzzle pieces together, the, “ _Clever girl_ …”

        They were all signs that she was close, very close. But to what?

        “But to what?” Clarice whispered as she came full circle around the paper ring once more. She stared down at the top page (one of the first briefings written over Buffalo Bill, back when it was a simple homicide and not a hunt for Northeast’s newest serial killer.) She reread it, gaze flitting over the words she already knew, and again, just as before, found nothing.

        With a sharp, “ _Dammit!_ ” Clarice kicked out a foot, breaking open the ring and sending a handful of pages fluttering across the carpet.

        A slap of heat tickled under the skin of her cheeks and down to her chest as her fists clenched harder at her sides, the crinkle of the questionnaire cutting the still air of the room. The frustration that had been lurking in her since the beginning of her involvement in case had cultivated into an overpowering body of anger; an anger fueled by the powerlessness she continued to feel (had always felt.)

        Wiping away the dampness around her eyes, Clarice stepped out of the ring and sat on her bed. The stack of photos there leaned at the weight and slumped against her thigh. She took a moment to breathe, catch herself, cool off, then looked down at the questionnaire in her tightened fist.

        She’d read the writings Lecter had left on the questionnaire, front to back, every loop and swirl of his neat cursive memorized. He’d answered each question in full with detailed, insightful responses; even the queries that simply asked “yes/no” received a paragraph long reply. And yet, through all of Lecter’s waxing, nothing that stood out. No _written_ hint.

        Clarice smoothed out the creases and flipped the questionnaire over. There, the black and white sketch of bent bodies stared up at her, the illusion of a skull now startlingly forthright. She had examined this also; each figures’ delicate face and body, every indent from the drag of the pencil that made them, each layer of graphite,

        Honesty, once passed the ghostly feeling it projected, it was a stunning picture. Though Clarice had never been one for the arts, she could appreciate it when done by skilled hands. And Lecter definitely had the skill. Even now, the photorealistic sketches that hung in the man’s cell were fresh in her mind, their attractiveness undiminished by the cheap paper they were drawn on. He was an artist at heart, with a talent for crafting the ostentatious even out of the more…rudimentary tools.

        She could still remember seeing one of Lecter’s kills for the first time, sitting in a darkened lecture hall of the 3 week class Pathology of Violence during her initial semester of academy. A floor to ceiling screen had displayed uncensored crime photos of notorious killers—Bundy, Miyazaki, Gaskins, Wuornos and so on. And then there was Lecter.

        There had been a collective intake of breath when his slide came up, but not because of the murder per se, yet the beauty of it. A young couple touring Europe had been the unfortunate participants in the slaying (one woman, strangled; one man, stabbed) and after a selection of their organs had been harvested, Lecter had laid them out just so as to where they almost looked to be lounging peacefully, eyes close merely to rest, in the fallout ditch near a drainage pipe. 

        The adjunct that had been directing the class went on to compare many of Lecter’s signature aspects to that of famous paintings, duplicating the works almost exactly, creating a 3D copy. “He is making something look the way he wasn’t it. He’s turning what, in his mind, is ugly into something that he in turn thinks is pretty,” the adjunct had said while flicking back between painting to photo, painting to photo, everything blurring together along the way.

        “As pretty as a picture.”

        Clarice fell out of her train of thought abruptly as everything in her mind went quiet. For a moment, all she could do was stare straight at the wall ahead of her, her body strangely stagnant. A chugging feeling, like wheels working uphill, drummed through her.

        The feeling kept on as she stood up from the bed and faced it, questionnaire in hand; as she looked down at the pile of photos there, now fallen to the side in a splayed line; as she slowly swiped a hand across them, a movement disconnected from the slurry mixing around in her head; as she scanned each glossy print, until her eyes locked onto one.

        Sliding the photo out of the lineup, Clarice held it up to her face with her free hand. The photo was an evidence shot—a close up of an insect that was found on one of Buffalo Bill’s victims. It sat stark against a white table and was bordered on both sides by right-angled rulers. Whoever had taken the picture had positioned the bug so its back was toward the viewer, showing off its flattened yellow wings and pointed abdomen.

        Centered in the middle of the insect’s thorax, right under the base of the back of the head, was a small skull. Or...not a skull, a marking. A marking that broke up the fuzzy brown fur that covered its host’s body (a splotch here, there,) creating a white circle with two dots at its center.

        A dryness crept over Clarice’s tongue as she looked from the photo to the sketch. Once, again, a third. “Oh my God…” she managed passed the sound of her heart slamming in her chest. “That’s it.”

        Hurriedly, she darted across the room, feet kicking up, stomping, scattering the pages of the ring, breaking the circle. She bee lined for the door, the picture and questionnaire still gripped in now shaky hands. Slamming it open, she darted out into the halls and down towards the stairs leading to the main floor of the housing building.

        Reaching the building’s lobby, Clarice casted her eyes quickly around the room. A scatter of people mingled around the television that hummed from the opposite end of the room, while a single body sat in one of the lounge chairs close to the stairs, head turned away from view.

        “Ardelia!” Clarice started, voice echoing loudly through the air as she hassled over to her friend. Ardelia looked up, head turning and shoulders twisting around at her name. She stared, surprised, and opened her mouth to speak.  

        “No, listen,” Clarice cut in. “Do you still have that entomologist’s number?”

        Here, Ardelia audibly gasped, the surprised look along her face now one of shock and outrage. She proceeded to hiss, lowly, voice tight and straining through clenched teeth. “ _Oh my god, Clarice_. That was one night!”

        Scoffing, Clarice shook her head, “That’s not what I mean.” Before the other could counter, she held out the papers in her hands.

        Ardelia blinked at the picture (processed it,) then turned to the drawing on the questionnaire (processed that.) She stared up at Clarice slowly, forehead furrowed, and jaw set. “What is this?” she asked.

        Clarice took a breath. “It’s our lead.”

<><><> 

        The laboratory center sat like a dark stain against the light from the cityscape behind it, its unlit windows gleaming black. Its parking lot was empty, the traces of any activity there shown by the remnant streaks of car tires in the powdered snow.

        Leaving her own tracks, Clarice inched her car forward across the asphalt. Beside her, Ardelia sat with her phone held close to her face, its glow illuminating and shadowing her skin. Her thumbs tapped across the device’s screen, paused, tapped again, then stilled. “He’s going to be at the back. He’ll let us in from there,” she said.

        Clarice nodded and turned the drive around the side of the building.

        As they pulled up and parked, a small back door centered near the middle of the building opened. There, the figure of Noble Pilcher stood. He was thin and lanky and even from afar, Clarice could spot the exceedingly large glasses and receding hairline. She had never met the man personally, but knew of him through the secondhand account Ardelia had shared with her the year previous: the one where, after a few good laughs and a few too many drinks, she and the young entomologist had spent both a night and an awkward morning together. Other than that, the only thing she knew about Pilcher was the fact that he could be extremely imperative to the case.

        When both Clarice and Ardelia hustled out of the car, Pilcher ushered them over and inside quickly and quietly. He firmly shut the door and locked it up with the golden key that hung on the lanyard around his neck. He then turned and smiled crookedly. “Hi guys,” he said, voice nasally yet surprisingly low. The greeting was meant for them both, yet his eyes stayed glued to Ardelia.

        “Clarice, this is Noble,” Ardelia said, swiping her hand between the two of them. “Noble, Clarice.”

        “Nice to meet you.” Clarice nodded and held out a hand.

        Pilcher’s gaze turned to her and he met the shake with a clammy palm. “Yeah, you too. We’re normally closed right now so this is going to have to be in and out, you know.” He turned back to Ardelia, crooked teeth flashing. “Good thing you kept my number, right?”

        Ardelia response was a hard, “No.”

        “Oh…” Pilcher cleared his throat sheepishly and continued. “So, I was told you guys want to see some bugs?”

        “One bug,” Clarice corrected. Sliding a hand into her coat, she fished out the crime photo. She held it out to Pilcher, who blinked at it widely behind the lenses of his glasses. “What can you tell me about this?”

        “Wow,” Pilcher gave a small, excited sort. He asked, smiling, “Is this from an actual case or something?” The grin dropped when Clarice met his question with a frown. He backtracked, “That’s okay, uh, you don’t have to tell me,” “Um…”

        Sniffing, Pilcher held out a long hand so it hovered under the photo, thumb and pointer fingers touched, ready to pluck it up. “May I?”

        Claire handed the photo over slowly.

        Swift hands moved the picture closer to Pilcher’s face as he eyed the pixilated insect. He raised it high into the air, objecting it to the murky light the bulbs above them gave, highlighting the paper. He rotated the photo left, left again, a complete 180°, prodding it and scrutinizing it and studying it with gentle fingers. All the while, small mutters and breaths escaped him (“Oh, yes. Yes, yes. That’s a looker...”) After a moment, he nodded slowly. “Yeah…yeah. I can tell you a lot.” A pause. “But, not here. Let’s go to the labs.”

        Moving from the doorway, he led them out into a long hallway dotted with the faces of shut doors. He walked down the third one on the right and swung it open. Inside, a maze of file cabinets, stacks of papers, and jars full of (presumably) dead insects greeted them. Floor to ceiling drawers took up the complete left side of the room, each one labeled with a name and a number, while a marked up dry-erase board the right. In the middle of the floor, a large, knee-high table sat. On it, six framed displays of mounted butterflies covered its wooden surface, their multicolored wings the pop of vibrancy in its greyscale environment. From here, any remaining trace of tabletop left to offer had been claimed by a bulky looking microscope and an assortment of plastic slides.

        “Welcome to my abode,” Pilcher quipped, arms spread. Then, offhandedly, “Mind the colepteros.”

        Clarice blinked then looked down at the small chess board she hadn’t noticed sitting on one of the lower filing cabinets. Replacing its playing pieces were tiny beetles, each one crawling black and white spaces were covered with tiny beetles crawling across. She gave the insects a quick smirk. “Is he always so…” Clarice whispered to Ardelia, sentence falling when words escaped her.

        “Strange? Yes,” Ardelia responded, exasperation sewn into the tone of her voice.

        Another smirk before Clarice turned back to watch as Pilcher floated skillfully through the cluttered room. He danced in front of the drawered wall now, quick hands pulling and shutting them one by one. After a moment more of this, he gave a loud, “There!” Whipping around, he held a small jar up in the air. “Ladies, say hello to the death’s-head hawkmoth,” he said, chest puffed, pride in his voice.

        Clarice looked at the moth lying stiffly in the jar, filing its name away in the back of her mind. Ardelia came in closer, peeking over her shoulder for a better view. Pilcher continued, “Acherontia styx, to be precise. Amazing little fella, really.” He cocked his head then. “It’s strange though…”

        “What?” Clarice’s eyes snapped back up.

        “It was found here, right?” he asked, tapping at the photo. Clarice nodded. “Well, this species of this genus is, uh, only found in Asia.” He shook the jar lightly. “To find one here, in Virginia, in this condition shown, well then someone must have imported it, like I did.”

        Lifting her chin, Clarice stayed silent. Then, “Condition?”

        “Well, yeah.” Without hesitation, Pilcher moved in closer and held both the jar and photo under their noses. He pointed to the moth in the picture’s abdomen and drew a circle over it with a tapered finger. “Look, here. If this moth was from a collection or a display, he would have been bought dead, uh, presumably. But this one died of old age.” He moved his finger to the jar. “See the difference in mine? Mine was bought dead. In yours, there’s also no sign of any preservation. No appendage relaxing fluid, no pin marks.

        “Whoever had this insect grew it, fed it, gave it dirt to pupate in—” Pilcher stopped abruptly, back straightening, and took a breath. “Uh, more to the point, whoever had it took extremely good care of it.”

        There was a beat where the air grew quiet, where Clarice drank in all that had been said. She took the photo and the jar from Pilcher and stared down at them. She stayed looking, then, “How could we figure out _who_ exactly took care of it?”

        At this, Pilcher shook his head. “Sorry,” he said quickly (too quickly?) “I can’t help you with that.”

        Clarice opened her mouth to speak when behind them, Ardelia gave a snort. “Oh, bullshit, Noble.” Moving passed Clarice, she crowded into Pilcher’s space, making the other take a step back. She crossed her arms and gave the man a steady look. “This is important and I’ve seen you on those chatrooms.”

        Clarice frown then quirked an eyebrow as the color in Pilcher’s face drained. He looked around nervously, then, quietly, “…They're forums…”

        Ardelia _hmm_ ed. “Yeah, and those weird bug auctions.”

        Pilcher’s voice cracked, “They’re dealer markets!”

        “They’re illegal!”

        By now, a nice sheen of sweat cover the crown of Pilcher’s head. He looked between Clarice and her friend, fingers reaching to adjust the line of his glasses. His sigh was shaky and small. “Please…don’t tell my boss.”

        Nodding, Ardelia moved back to her spot by Clarice’s side, a smug smile on her lips. Clarice gave her a glance before turning to Pilcher. “We won’t, if you help us.” The man scratched at his neck, hesitant. Clarice pushed once more. “Please. Whatever you can do could end up helping a lot of people.”

        Pilcher stared at her, a skeptical look playing across his face.  He pushed up at his glasses once more and swiped his tongue over thin lips. “O-Ok. Uh…There is a—for lack of a better word—a black-market for exotic insects that I…sometimes frequent. The guy who runs it knows all the goings on in the bug trade.”

        “Would he know if anyone around this area would have imported them?”

        “He should. But, I have no idea if he’ll help or not. These people are super private,” Pilcher said. Sighing deeply, he turned and walked over to one of the filing cabinets. Shoving a heap of paper to the side, he opened up the laptop that had been hiding underneath. The empty screen whirred to life and a blue screensaver was brought up.

        Moving to either side of him, Clarice and Ardelia watched as Pilcher rolled his thumbs over the computer’s mousepad. He clicked on the icon of an orange circle that sat to the far right of the screen. There was a stall where a loading bar flickered on the screen before the entire monitor took on a startlingly neon green color.

        This new display was blank other than a white textbox that hugged the corner of the screen. In it was a username that Clarice assumed was Pilcher’s. A blinking curser sat beside it, waiting for keys to be struck and words to be written.

        “Let’s see if he’s on,” Pilcher said and curved his fingers over the keypad. He typed, hit ENTER:

**PhD_PIL: Are you online?**

         Barely a minute passed before the computer screen shook and a new username bumped up underneath Pilcher’s. The space beside it stayed empty, before string of letters scrolled across the screen:

**_n_sec: what do u need_ **

        Pilcher turned slightly in his seat, smile all teeth, raised cheeks pushing on his glasses. He laughed boyishly, “He bit.” Turning back, he typed quickly.

        **PhD_PIL: Nothing, this time. I was hoping you could help me out with something?**

        (This response came quicker, yet remained the same.)

**_n_sec: what do u need_ **

**PhD_PIL: I need information about imports of death’s head to the northeast U.S.**

**_n_sec: i cant disclose that_ **

**PhD_PIL: Have you had any buyers at least?**

**_n_sec: i cant disclose that_ **

         Here, Ardelia let out a low groan. “He’s not going to give…” She turned her voice to Clarice and whispered, “There must be another way to figure this out than lurking around the internet.”

        “Now, just hold on a second,” Pilcher said defensively, holing up a silencing hand. “This might work.” He took a moment, breathed deeply, then typed. His keystrokes were decisive.

**PhD_PIL: You owe me for the Lotus Blue.**

         The typed words sat lifelessly against the white textbox, alone, unanswered. The other username appeared once again, but with no response. A blinking ellipses was displayed, a signal of hesitation and silence. It stayed this way (dot, dot, dot…) before disappearing completely.

        Clarice let out an involuntary gasp. “What did you do?”

        “Nothing,” he said, not looking away from the screen. He breathed deeply and nodded, “Just wait. Give him a second.”

        Clarice watched as the ellipses flashed back onto the screen suddenly. It blinked, blinked, blinked, then:

**_n_sec: this makes us even_ **

        Almost instantly, the messaging board shut down. A glimpse of the blue home-screen was shown, then a new window opened; this one, containing an opened JPEG file of a screenshot. The page was a grid like document, its columns and rows filled with names, dates, fluctuating amounts of money, types of money (U.S. Dollars, Euros, Yen,) and what appeared to be addresses.

        Near the middle of the picture, a cluster of 7 rows had been highlighted. In the last cell of each one, the words _deathshead_ had been typed.

        “This must be a part from his books,” Pilcher said, breaking the silence that had blanketed the room.  He leaned in closer to the screen, nose almost rubbing the glass. “It looks like he’s only done six-no, seven shipments of your moth recently.”

        “And which of those seven have been shipped to the U.S.?” Clarice asked.

        “I’m printing you a copy now,” Pilcher said, clinking at the file. There was a processing sound from behind them, then the soft chugging of ink swiping across paper from a printer hidden amongst the disorderly room. Twisting around, he stretched out a lanky arm and snatched the page out of the printer’s tray. He shook the page dry before handing it over to Clarice.

        Beside her, Ardelia tipped her head, concentration lining her brow. “There’s…only one,” she said, pointing at the graph.

        Clarice followed her friend’s finger There in the 4th highlighted row, the _export_ cell was labeled U.S.A. Skirting her eyes to the side, she found the name of the recipient the insect had been shipped to.

        The name read Jame Gumb.

* * *

 

 P.S. I have no clue how black-market trade works! It probably isn't so easy as clicking on buttons, or maybe it is...hmm....

 


	15. Barbera

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I’m one of the lucky ones, you know, to survive those years."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So thankful for summer! Now I have time to finish this story up :'v Thank you everyone still foloowing along and leaving comments and kudos! You are all spectacular and wonderful.

        “What are you going to do?”

        Clarice could feel Ardelia’s eyes darting from the road to her, from one to another and back again. But, she didn’t look up to meet her. She couldn’t. Her sight was set, unmoving, on the name at the bottom of the page in front of her.

_Name: Jame Gumb._

_Address: Lindbergh Avenue, Shaler Township, Pennsylvania, USA_

_Purchase: death’s-head hawkmoth_

        It was the only one that matched on every count. The insect, the country, the region—was all there in black and white.

        The minute the Academy’s parking lot was in view, Clarice told Ardelia to stop the car. Hurriedly, unbuckled and swung the door open, leg reaching out to put the heel of her foot on solid ground while the rest her body curved forward, catching her purse close to her chest. She turned to Ardelia and shoved the paper into her lap. (She wouldn’t need it anymore. She had the information engraved into her back of her skull.)

        “Make sure this gets to Sesske. It has to.”

        Ardelia took the page in hand. Her chest was heaving, breath quick, the air around her energized. “What are you going to do?”

        Before answering, Clarice hustled herself out of the car and dug out her keys. She breathed deeply then looked back at her friend.

        When Pilcher had finished with their copies and she held proof, actual proof, she knew it was done. The case was solved. They’d done it ( _she’d_ done it) and knowing this made her chest insanely tight and blood course fast and hot. And yet, when the idea of…winning (yes, winning. She’d won. Finally.) settled comfortably inside her, all she could think of next was Lecter.

        It was startling that her mind had gone to the older man; not so much the thoughts themselves, yet the feelings it brought with them. She’d felt the same denseness, the same planting, unbinding sensation before. It’d spurred in her numerous times during her youth, back when her father still sat in his favorite chair in the corner of their living room instead of lying 6 feet under in West Virginia.

        It would appear, suddenly, quietly, and wrack her body numb each time she accomplished something. Not matter the size of the task (a good grade, a code cracked, a lace tied,) once conquered, the feeling would come. And then she would go to her father.

        She would present him her achievements and once he nodded, once he spoke— _“Job well done, kido.”_ —the feeling would vanish.

        Only that confirmation, that act of someone as knowing as her father to approve what she had done, would rid of the feeling. So when her father passed, the confirmation passed as well. There was simply no one left to offer her the authentication she wanted, she _needed_. The only person she had ever worked hard for was her father and herself. Everyone else was inapt, specks in her peripheral vision. Over the years, the feeling remained, never relived, and with time was buried in her, dormant and waiting.

        And then there was Lecter and the feeling buoyed to the surface.

        “I have to see someone,” Clarice finally said. A shorter pause, then, pointing to the paper in Ardelia’s hand, “Get that to him, ok? Please.”

        “I will,” Ardelia nodded, voice even.

<><><> 

        Clarice shut the car door and watched as Ardelia peeled out into the dark. There was no doubt in her mind that that paper was going to be on Sesske’s desk by morning. It was in the best of hands.

        Keys stuck between the gaps of her fingers, Clarice jogged over to her where her car was parked in the lot. She needed to see Lecter, hear from his mouth that she had done right, followed the clues he’d given her, and ultimately came to the right ending. Only after that would she be able to revel in what she’d managed to do.

        Reaching the hood of her car, she circled it, arm already straightening as she went for the door’s handle. “Clarice Starling?”

        Clarice jumped at her own name, hair raising, skin tingling, and whipped her head around.

        There in the dark with her stood a woman. She was small (in height and in heft) and shockingly pale against the mas of thick red hair that surrounded around her face. Age was debatable as with every slight movement she made lines would appear across her forehead and around the eyes before skin seemingly returned to a youthful smoothness. She wore simple jeans with a bulky yet slick coat and a large camera bag hung at her side. There was an ID around her neck, yet the front of the card was strategically turn inward, away from view.

        She took in Clarice’s start with a shadowed smile and an empty, “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.”

        Clarice breathed for a moment, initial shock morphing into something wearier. She managed, “Can I help you?”

        The woman’s smile widened, shadows darkened. She moved a pocketed hand to her ID and held it up, it’s plastic face still turned backwards. “Margaret Rothman. _PressBox_.” She let the card and hand fall, then, “I was wondering if you might have a moment to talk with me.”

        Clarice hovered where she stood, right thigh just touching the front of her car, hand still reaching out the distance to the front door. She blinked at Ms. Rothman then shook her head. “Uh, no. I don’t.”

        Turning back, Clarice moved half a step before stopping. Looking back, slowly, thinking the action through, and looked Rothman in the eye. “Why?”

        Rothman stared over for a beat. “Why what?”

        “Why do you want to talk to me?”

        At this, Rothman’s smile pulled down at the sides, lips now forming a strange waving line. “I read an article about the Bureau’s involvement with Hannibal Lecter. I was hoping you would give me your side of the story.” When the air between them remains silent after she finishes, Rothman gives an easy chuckle. “Hey, I’m just looking for a story here, you know.”

        There is more silence, then Clarice speaks, lowly: “My name was never mentioned in that article.”

        The smile fell all the way this time. Rothman blinked and inhales dramatically, exhales the same way, warm breath turning to wisps in the cold air. She worked her jaw around, teeth touching teeth, and sighed again. “You read it?”

        “I was…read some of it,” Clarice said. “It never mentioned my name. It said _an FBI agent_ , which I’m not one, so why are you talking to me?”

        Rothman gave a tight, short laugh. “Damn. I could have sworn you were an agent.”

        Clarice stilled. “You wrote the article…?”

        Rothman ignored the question in favor of reaching into the camera bag. She pulled out the top end of a small grey recorder, its old-fashion tape spinning silently (recording.) She clicked it off and then walked closer.

        Clarice tensed and stilled as the other got within arms-reach. “Freddie Lounds,” the woman said dully. “ _Tattle Crime_.” Brushing back a red curl, she added, “Did you like it?”

        “You made public classified information,” Clarice bit back.

        Lounds smiled, shrugged. “It’s my job.”

        “I thought it was reporting gossip and lies.”

        “Everything I do is the hard truth. I write what I know so others may know. And they want to know, believe me.”

        Clarice nodded. “Aren’t you generous.” A pause, then, “How did you know about the consultations?”

        “I like to keep an eye on the things that make me money, and Hannibal Lecter has made me _quite_ a bit of that,” Lounds said. “So has Will Graham. When I heard that someone made a show of sneaking in to talk to him—”

        “Heard from who?” Clarice cut in, frowning.

        Lounds studied Clarice from head to toe, then quirked an eyebrow. “I’ve never been without friends.” She tipped her head to the side as she spoke next. Her eyes looked distant. “I’m one of the lucky ones, you know, to survive those years. A lot of people didn’t and I came close.”

        “But, no cigar, huh?”

        Clarice watched as Lounds flashed a sharp, tight-lip smile. Looking away for the first time, she glanced down at the watch peeking out from under her coat sleeve. “I think we’re done now,” she said before moving the last few steps to the side of her car. She wrapped her hand around the door’s handle, jabbed her key in, and opened it. Sitting on the edge of the driver’s seat, she flung her purse to the opposite side while tracking Lounds’ walk over.

        “What I’m trying to say is,” the other said, leaning her elbows on the curve of the open door. She stared down at Clarice, hair falling around her face, blackening it in its shade, “I only learned how dangerous those men were simply because I couldn’t stop digging.”

        Clarice gave Lounds’ comment a hardened frown. “Did you come here to tell me to stop “digging”?”

        “Oh, no. Quite the opposite. I like how you work. You don’t give a shit. I haven’t seen that in a person for a long time, not even in myself. That’s why I’m going to tell you something.”

        The car swayed slightly as Lounds leaned further on the car. Clarice looked up at her quietly and listened. “There was a deal,” she whispered. “They’re both being shipped out. Tonight. Lecter and Graham.”

        Clarice felt her mouth go dry. “What?”

        She began to ask more ( _“How? When? Why?”_ ) but Lounds raises a palm. “Never without friends, remember?”

        Pushing off the car, Lounds stood back a few feet and popped the high collar of her coat. Pausing, she looked towards the building side of the parking lot and raised the corner of her nose with a sniff. She continued, “If you’re interested, they touch down in Memphis International and go right to the courthouse there for holding.”

        “ _Memphis_?” Clarice croaked, voice disbelieving and hoarse.

        “I did come here to get you to talk,” Lounds said, “But maybe for another time, hmm?” Pulling back an arm, she dropped a hand into the camera bag draped from her shoulder. The hand comes back with a small white business card touched between two fingers. Lounds lowered it in front of Clarice’s face. She took it slowly. “Call me anytime. We’ll talk, maybe make you famous.”

        Breathing hard, Clarice flipped the card over and read the small printed number on the back. Looking over it once, she turned back to Lounds. “Thank you,” she said, “but I don’t think I want your kind of famous.” And parting her fingers slightly, she let the card drop through the opening of the car door.

        Lounds’ eyes tracked its fall, studied it as it landed on the black asphalt, and smiled. “Don’t be surprised if I write about you after this.”

        “I’ll make a note to avoid it,” Clarice said shortly and shut the door.

* * *

 

P.S. the address listed for Buffalo Bill is the actual place where they shot in SOL which I found on the shooting locations page on [imdb](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102926/locations)!


	16. Rosé

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Whatever happens, whatever is done, remember that our estrangements, however long they be, always tend end in a reunion.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my, it is a joyous time to be a Fannibal! I am basically living and breathing for August, 2017 now :'v But here is chapter 16, flipping finally. An enormous thank you to everyone/anyone still hanging on and leaving comments and kudos. You guys are so wonderful and lovely and patient!!  
> (Rated M for mentions of sex and some language)

_Oct, 2025—_

        The air in the room was warm, dense, and smelled of sex. Will inhaled the lingering scent deeply, letting it cling in his nose and roll down his tongue. A mass of wrinkled sheets covered his body, hiding his nude form from the hints of moonlight that drifted through parted window curtains.

        Beside him (close enough to breathe the same breath) Hannibal lay. They faced each other, arms slung around waists and shoulders, the lines of their bodies seamless—chest to chest, legs tangled, hips pressed snug, cool sweat and warm cum cementing them together.

        Their kisses were slow, leisurely, pleasantly exhausted. Tongues and teeth met in the same manner they had countless times before. The beat of Will’s heart drummed up his neck as Hannibal’s fingers ghosted along his side. They mapped out the bumps of his ribs (top to bottom, bottom to top,) strumming each bone like a harp string, blunt nails barely scratching skin. Will swallowed dryly and pulled away from the kiss to mouth at the damp skin behind the others ear.

        A low moan echoed around him as Hannibal leaned into the touch. After a moment, he raised a hand and caught the point of Will’s chin. He edged him away (not too far, just barely) blown pupils taking him in, inquiring. They stayed this way for a beat, staring, before Hannibal spoke, voice heavy: “What are you seeing, Will?”

        Will blinked and tightened his sore limbs around his husband’s chest. (You, Will thought. Me and you. Me _in_ you.) “Us,” he finally whispered and buried his face under the shadow of Hannibal’s jaw. He kissed at the curve of an Adam’s apple, lower to the rise of a collarbone. Then, quietly, he added: “They found us.”

        Almost three weeks previous, Will had noticed the changes.

        First was the car, an inconspicuous grey and black mini with tinted windows and fading bumper stickers. It would be parked down the end of their street every morning when he’d go for his jog, tucked away in the same spot near the small corner café, and be gone before he got back. Next were the new faces (specifically _5_ new faces.) They would pass down the adjacent sidewalk from their apartment, eyes hidden under shades or the shadow of a hat, pace a little too quick to be habitual. Sometimes they walked in pairs, mostly not, always twice around the block.

        There were other subtleties, itches at the base of Will’s neck, but it wasn’t until quietness set in that he realized what was happening. It covered the whole neighborhood, choked it, making even the smallest of sounds seemed too submerged to hear. Everything was on edge, holding back its breath, waiting, and Will (finally, hopelessly) accepted the inevitable—they had been found, and soon, too soon, they would be caught.

        Of course, Hannibal had noticed too, maybe even earlier than he had, yet Will still felt the need to state the obvious. Halfway through a (achingly) quiet dinner, between bites of cooked meat, he said bluntly: “We’re fucked.”

        Hannibal’s answer had been a simple nod and a sip of his wine. 

        Now, above him, Hannibal sighed into Will’s hair, pulling him back from his thoughts. “Yes. They have.”

        Will took a breath (sighed) then closed his eyes.  “They’re going to separate us.”

        “They will.”

        “What are we going to do?”          

        Here, Hannibal arched his body slightly, shifting across the bed, and letting Will’s arms fall off him limply. He sat up, braced on elbows, and looked down at the curve of his chest. He started, mouth opening, then stopped. After a pause, he said, “You’re going to run.”

        “I’m sorry?” Will felt his brow crease. He followed his partner and sat up, the two now shoulder-to-shoulder once again. He put a hand on Hannibal’s thigh (touch heavier than usually, nails digging a tad deeper into muscle.) “ _You’re_?”

        Hannibal stayed still, then, “Yes. You will go, and I will stay.”

        “What are you talking about?” Will bit out, grip on the others body tightening. He leaned over so that his face was inches away from Hannibal’s, and shook his head. “No, look at me. _That_ is not how _this_ works, Hannibal. We both go, or we both leave.”

        “I’m—” Hannibal began, eyes still trained on his chest. He exhaled deeply, breath swaying greying chest hair, then swallowed. “I’m preserving your freedom. I don’t care if I’m caged, I’ve been through it all before.”

        “ _My_ freedom?” Will scoffed. “That’s—wait, have you forgotten that I also went to jail?”

        “You did not spend years in confinement, Will. It is drastically different.” Finally, Hannibal looked up and met Will’s stare. His eyes were glassy. “It is hell. Day by day, you lose every sense of the world and what it was like before it was kept in a box. Then you revert into yourself and it all become blurred.” Hannibal stopped abruptly to grab up Will’s hand from his leg and hold it tightly. “Insanity spurs from isolation, Will. It is a torture that I have withstood and one that I do not want you to suffer through.”

        For a moment, Will’s tongue can’t form words and his heart thumps awkwardly against his ribs. He gawked at Hannibal, the heated scowl that had formed on his face now slowly cracking, pieces falling to show a more vulnerable mask. Dropping his head between his shoulders, he blinked down at the hand holding his own. The gold band that wrapped around one finger glinted back up at him.

        Panic, anger, sadness, desperation (and more, much, much more,) were all coursing through him. The thought of being apart from Hannibal was unthinkable. Unbearable. For the last ten years they had been fixed to each others side, sutured together by an invisible thread through their skins. And this was all Will knew.

        Nothing outside the home he and Hannibal had made registered with him anymore, nor did he want it to. He was content (he was _happy_ ) with his life for the first time, ant yet any day now, guns and cuffs and bars would ruin it all. In any other situation, he would eliminate the threat—kill it with his own two hands, make it disappear—but this was bigger than him. Bigger than both of them.

        “I don’t want to,” Will choked, head still hung.

        “Will,” Hannibal sighed the name. “ _Shh._ Listen now.” Curling forward, he kissed Will’s brow, the bumps of his eyes, the side of his jaw, the shell of his ear. “Listen to me. We have been here before. Whatever happens, whatever is done, remember that our estrangements, however long they be, always tend end in a reunion.”

        Will sniffed softly and when Hannibal moved his hand away, placed fingers to his chin, he nodded. “A bloody reunion...”

        Smiling, Will raised his head and wrapped arms around Hannibal’s neck. They held one another, tightly (not tight enough) and rubbed their bare bodies with ghost-like touches. They kissed, once, then Hannibal whispered, words spoken into the hollow of Will’s mouth, “When they come, you must run.” Another kiss, one that flushed the rounds of Will’s cheeks. Another whisper, one followed by and hardened stare. “Promise me, Will.”

        Will returned the gaze unblinking. For a long beat, all they did was breath, the spots above their hearts rubbing together with each inhale. Then he nodded. “I promise,” he said, and accepted the tight embrace Hannibal pulled him into.

        Yes, he would run, but not for long. Never for long.

<><><> 

        When they landed, the plane bounced once then rolled silently down the rest of the tarmac. Hannibal craned his head to look out the small window behind him, the first movement he’d made during the whole of the trip. Outside, a nighttime scene of an almost empty airport greeted him. Stationary planes that read _MEM_ on their sides (Memphis? Hannibal thought, then understood) and parked cars that littered the airstrip were lit up by brilliant spotlights and the interchanging reds and blues from police car lights. In the shadows, compact clusters of people (Press? Yes.) milling around an unlit hangar could be made out. Next to them, men with guns around theirs neck and coddled in the crook of their arms stood at attention.

        Turning forward, Hannibal looked across his seat to the line of armed guards lining the opposite side of the plane. Their heads were down (had been down the entire way) and their fingers lay of the black jut of triggers. He registered each of their gear-clad faces for what must have been the hundredth time, then looked to his feet.

        Hannibal had been halfway through a sketch of Bernini's _Apollo and Daphne_ , pencil tip rounding the chins of Romanesque faces and the leaves of laurel tree branches, when his cage was opened. He had been so lost in thought, in memory, that he hadn’t sensed Barney approaching the cell bars, nor the fleet of guards that trekked behind him. They’d shared words, he and Barney:

        “Mr. Matthews.”

        “Hello, Dr. Lecter.”

        “What do I own the honor?”

        “…We’re taking you out.”

        And they did. Barney unlocked his pen and the guards raised their guns. Hannibal was compliant, naturally. He followed orders—stand, hands up (behind the head,) legs spread, eyes to the ground—and did not ask questions. Maybe when he was younger he would have been more vocalized, more resistant, but now he couldn’t find himself to care less.

        Barney, along with another hospital attendant, entered the cell and slipped him into that familiar white jacket that hugged him snug. A mouth guard was then strapped across his face by the shaky hands of the other attendant, fixed enough to his skin that the plastic outline of the mask dug into his cheekbones.

        He was taken out of the cell block then, up through the elevator, all the way to the lobby. It struck Hannibal rather hard when he realized that he had not been to that area since the first day he’d been carted into the facility, a long five years ago. There was no time to marvel the fact, however, or the fact that they’d then taken him into the open-air of the back lawn or the fact that that sensation of wind on his neck made him sigh or the forgotten smell of grass in his nose made him choke. He was moved too quickly for any prolonged moments of pleasure to be had and as soon as he was outdoors, he was shoved into the metal body of a plane, once again confined.

        As the plane finally shuttered to a stop, the guards all stood from their seats. Hannibal remained still, simply watching. After a moment, the large door of the plane clicked and swung open. A rush of cool air to seep into the cabin. A pair of young men entered the plane then. Under the Kevlar vest, Hannibal could see their semi-formal dress of button ups and khakis. At their waists, a small pistol and other assortments hung along with a tangle of plastic zip ties. Tucked behind their ears, communication wires draped down their necks and disappeared under their shirt collar. All this screamed “private security,” but the boys’ posture confirmed “ _inept_ private security.”

        Three more men stepped into the plane, the last pushing a dolly out in from of him, before anyone spoke.

        “Stand up,” the one with the dolly said, then added, “Slowly.”

        Hannibal blinked at him, then, rocking forward, stood up.

        “Turn around.”

        Hannibal did.

        The squeak of the dolly’s wheels burned into Hannibal’s ears as it was rolled up behind him. Without instruction, he shuffled slowly backwards until he was flush against the dolly. Two of the new guards came from the sides, bracketing him with their bodies. Each took one of the loose Velcro straps hanging off of the dolly and pulled them over, one across his chest, the other under the dip of his kneecaps. A hand went behind his head and his neck snapped back as a chain was clipped onto the fasteners holding the mouth guard around his jaw.

        Grabbing the handles of the dolly, one of the men kicked it forward so it balanced solely on its tires. Joltingly, he whipped it and Hannibal around to face the front of the plane.

        A final man, in the same uniform as the others, climbed inside. The ambience of misplaced self-importance clung to him along with the smells of cheap aftershave, a scent as strong as it was unpleasant. As he walked fully into the hull of the plane—boots stomping and dragging along the aluminum floor in a gait that made Hannibal’s lips curl—he stopped in the middle of the guards and placed his hands on his hips.

        He stared at Hannibal, necking rolling until it popped, then smiled. “Welcome to Memphis, Dr. Lecter. My name is Lt. Boyle,” he said. “I’m in charge of the security here, and _you_ , for the next few hours at least.” Moving closer, he aligned his face with Hannibal’s, a hairsbreadth apart. The grin on his face widened and his tone slowed, as if talking to a child. “Now this is going to be real simple: we’ll treat you like you treat us, yeah? Play nice, and we got no problems. Act up, well…”

        Hannibal watched out of the corner of his eye as Boyle reached around his back and pulled a Taser from his belt. He inched it up so the black plastic cartridge hovered near the side of Hannibal’s temple, then held down the button. A low heat turned into sharp sparks of blue and white. Singeing electricity danced between the small metal conductors, spiking through the air, warming it.

        After a moment, Boyle smiled (tilt of the lips wider, uglier than before) and removed his thumb, letting the charge die out. “50,000 volts,” he said, a chuckle in his voice.

        Hannibal looked on quietly before slowly matching the smile, all the while making sure to memorize the man’s face.

        “He’s coming up now, sir,” one of the men said behind them breaking the silence, finger holding down his earpiece.

        Nodding, Boyle finally backed away. Slipping the Taser back into its holster, he stood next to the rest of his men and put his hands behind his back. There was a clamor from the stairs positioned against the plane then. The steps sounded off, strange, almost three-footed. Hannibal listened to the noise as it grew and glanced to the door.

        It would have been a lie if he had said he wasn’t surprised to see the person who then stepped in. It was a new sensation, as Frederick Chilton had never been a surprise to him before; he’d always been one of the easiest men to read, so predictable and fidgety, like a rat scurrying through a maze with only one way out. The detail that the other man hadn’t faced him even once through their years of playing captor and captive only added to Hannibal’s moment of shock.

        Apart from the obvious facial—and no doubt body—modifications he had been subjected to, Frederick looked the same as he had when they’d last met. His black hair, now more sculpted and slick, still parted over his scalp like a wave. The familiar aura of distaste still shrouded his waxy face: nose hiked up at the side, lips tight, drooped eyes ridiculing. Even his penchant for wearing his wealth on his sleeve was still blinding; the cane that barred his weight had an expensive sheen to it and the suit on his back was no less pristine.

        He did not look at Hannibal as he moved across the space, came in close and stopped by Lt. Boyle’s side.

        “Evening, sir,” Boyle nodded, voice raised to cut through the gusts of wind along the air. He turned and snapped his fingers at one of his men. A clipboard holding a text-filled piece of paper was placed in his hand immediately. “If you may, sign right here and we'll have us a legal transfer.”

        “Oh, lovely,” Frederick drawled.  Gingerly plucking a pen from his breast pocket, he scratched a quick signature along the bottom of the page.

        Pleased, Boyle handed the clipboard off and stepped away, leaving Frederick in the center of the small congregation that had been formed. He stood there for a beat, gaze flitting. A deep sigh swelled his chest before leaving his shoulders stooped and his head cocked. Placing his cane in front of him, both hands on the grip, his eyes finally settled on Hannibal’s. “Hello Hannibal,” he said.

        Hannibal let a steady exhale rush from his nose before he responded in turn, “Hello Frederick.”

        Frederick tipped his head further, leaned harder on his cane. “I’m sure you’re wondering why we’re all here?”

        This time, Hannibal remained silent. He knew he would be enlightened (he always was,) whether he wanted to be or not.

        Frederick continued, undeterred by the mute reply. “Soon,” he said, “a plane carrying Senator Ruth Martin—you know her, I’m sure. Mother of the latest girl snagged by…whoever he is. I refuse to call him that horrid trending twitter hashtag—she will land and she will ask you a few questions. And if you answer these questions, you will be trundled off to a wonderful holding center in Nashville where you can frolic and be merry for the rest of your life, away from me.”

        Hannibal’s eyes fluttered shut before they could roll as the last bits of Frederick’s voice dissolved through the air. Simply by speaking, the other man had lowered himself back to being tediously unsurprising.

        Just like all the other _stills_ that surrounded him, Frederick’s fevered lust for fame and fortune was still blatantly apparent. It dictated every thought he formed, action he made, every breath he took, then and now. The whole business of dragging him here, putting on a show for the media, was all meant for a fleeting moment in the sun. Hannibal was also more than certain that, similar to transactions between the doctor and the distinguished FBI, this Senator Martin had already slipped a well cashed hand under the table for their involvement.

        “If I don’t answer the questions?” Hannibal finally rejoined flatly.

        Frederick tutted at this, a wet click on tongue on teeth. He shook his head slowly, eyes shut, and shrugged dramatically. “Well then,” he said, words light as they fell, slow to impact, “I suppose you’ll never get to see Will Graham again.”

        The name affect Hannibal instantly and unceremoniously. It surged through with such force and furor that there was no way to prevent its drive as it ghosted over his lips. “Will?”

        “Oh!” Frederik gave a small gasp and brought a finger up to his lips. He batted a pair of wide eyes innocently. “Did I forget to mention this?” Taking his finger away, he pointed out one of the small windows of the plane.

        Hannibal followed the line from fingertip to one of the adjacent planes sitting immobile on the tarmac. He looked, hard, but could not see passed dark or the distance; a vivid image overtook him for a moment, one of Will leaning forward against his own dark windows while he searched across the void dividing them, searched for him. Even apart they were symmetrical.

        At some point, he craned too far and the chain tethering his head to the dolly snagged and snapped him back. The jerk incited a sharp, involuntary growl from him, one that startled sense back into him. He blinked quickly and composed himself, head facing forward once more and gritted his teeth harshly behind the line of his now closed mouth.

        He locked eyes with Frederick who watched him, smirk firm on his lips, body leaning back to examine like a child with a new toy. “He’s right over there, waiting just like you,” he said, pointing to the window again. “The same deal is on the table for him. If you boys follow instructions, you’ll be put in opposing cells in the same wing after this. Pretty nice, huh?”  

        He casted a look over his shoulder to Boyle and his men, all still waiting, before hobbling the small distance between them. He stopped short, body crowded in close. “I’ve watched over you for so long, Hannibal,” he whispered, something strident in his voice. “I know what’s best for you, and I assure you, this is it. This is the very best you will ever get.”

        There was a pause, where the unnerving shine layering the glass of Frederick’s eye was extinguished by the shadow of his brow, before he lifted his cane its top touched on Hannibal’s mouth guard. It hovered there, metal handle resting against hard plastic, tapped at it briskly, harshly, each hit separating the words: “So don’t be an idiot and let it slip by.”

        A steady _beat, beat, beat_ from a distended vein thrummed against Hannibal’s temples. Will was a deadly trump card when it came to him—he knew this, had _known_ this for far too long, maybe even long enough for cracks to form in his poker face, ones deep and jagged enough so the world could peak in on his weakness—and once again, it was making him fold. It filled him with a wrathful hate, a burning hate, like hot embers in his gut, to see how transparent he had gotten. Even more, at how mindlessly, foolishly people thought they could get away with exploiting such a thing.

        Mouth curling, Hannibal started, “You know, I would love to meet the surgeons that put you back together, Frederick. They did a lovely job. You are not as ugly as I imagined you would be.”

        A quick sneer flashed across Frederick’s face before he shook his head. He chuckled (hollowly) and brought his cane back to the ground with a harsh jolt. “Au Revoir, Hannibal,” he finally said, slowly stepping backwards, not yet breaking their gaze. “Please behave. For once.”

        He turned fully away and shambled towards the way he came in. Passing him, he muttered something to Boyle through capped teeth before ducking through the plane door, out of sight.

        Without missing a beat, one of the new guards said, “Ready to move, sir.”

        Boyle response was a throaty grunt and he leaned over and rapped his knuckles against the wall to the cockpit: a signal, a go ahead, to drop the back hatch as it hummed and jerked suddenly before dropping to the ground. Hannibal was tilted back once more and wheeled down to the now unmovable ramp. There was a jostled movement where the dolly’s tires snagged on the lip of the ramp before it smoothly carried him out of the plane and into the open.

        Almost instantaneously, camera flashes popped and the shadowed crowd of people waiting on the tarmac all began to murmur. Their voices buzzed and echoed, Hannibal’s name on their lips, while their hands clawed and reached for his attention. For a brief moment, Hannibal scanned what he could of the mob, eyes looking for the red jut of Freddie Lounds’ hair.  

        The new guards huddled around him, creating a shield against the clamoring crowd with their bodies. They quickened their pace as they steered him across the landing over to the gather of parked cars and policeman standing idly. They placed the dolly flat on the ground then, kicking out its stand so that Hannibal stood back straight and still, a centerpiece in white amidst the black tar asphalt.

        Boyle paced up beside him, feet still dragging, finger once again pressing into the dip of his ear. He moved to the closest of the cars, a gunmetal Buick, and gripped its door handle.

        More cameras clicked and bulbs flared as the door was swung open and a gracefully aged woman stepped out. She wore a draping coat, the black fabric melding with the sharp skirt suit that hid underneath. Her stature was somewhat smaller than average, yet the rigidity of her back, the height her chin was held, and the loft of her glossy heels made her appear large in the same manner as a pillar of stone. Hannibal allowed himself to take her in (her look, smell, mere presence), then spoke:

        “Senator Martin,” he greeted.

        The Senator stayed closed to the car as she regarded him silently. The bob of blonde hair atop her head flutter weightlessly against the night breeze, spindling around her square jaw. She brushed a few strands back into place and nodded. “Dr. Lecter. I’m…” she paused to cast a look over to the paparazzi as their shutters snapped, “I’m thankful that you have agreed to help us.”

        Hannibal answered slowly, “Oh, not yet.”

        The Senator frowned, skin wrinkling. “I’m sorry?

        She stared on as Hannibal tried (failed) to shift his shoulders under the binds of his jacket. He sighed, “I _am_ here to offer aid, but not yet.” His eyes flicked to the plane Chilton had pointed to, now so much closer, now seemingly much more real, and swallowed. “I would like to see him.”

        A suited man, with pale hands tight around a brief case, had joined the Senator from the car. He eyed Hannibal warily, then directed his stare towards the jetliner 50 yards away. “There’s no reason for that,” he said.

        “There is if you want my compliance.”

        Hannibal’s voice came out as an incidental growl and Boyle took a step forward, spacing himself between him and the Senator. “ _Watch it!_ ”

        “Enough,” the Senator waved a hand through the air, silencing all. She looked Hannibal, took a breath (another,) then turned to the suited man. “Do what he says.”  

        Hannibal felt his heart palpitate quickly as the suited man let out a withering sigh then snapped sharply at the row of police fencing the plane. Another signal, as one of the policeman jogged to the front of the plane.

        The crowd, the guards, the officers, Hannibal himself, all turned their heads in unison as the plane gave a mechanic hiss. Its back end unlocked and began to drop in the same manner the other had. The ramp descended slowly until it touched with the ground.

        Hannibal smelled him before he even saw him. And oh, the _smell._

        The scent crawled under the lines of his mouth guard and Hannibal dared to taste the air with his tongue, teasing it out, and wiping it across his top lip. An amalgam of earthy musk and sweat and something gorgeously raw (something akin to the ocean and cliffs, to blood and skin, to beds and moans, to life, to love—) buried itself deep within the pockets of his nose and steamed up into his skull, baking him inside out. It drew tears, dabs of wetness along the bottom lids of his eyes that burnt each blink.

        A similar uproar of shouts and frantic hands that had greeted Hannibal came from the crowd of onlookers once again as a trio of men began to inch down the ramp. The one in front, an orderly by the bleach-white uniform he wore, lead while another in the same dress took up the back, arms taunt as he hung onto the handles of a metal wheelchair that rolled out in front of him. The body in the chair was hidden from view, but the _smell_ grew stronger.

        When the group made their way to the bottom of the slope, the orderly in front stepped to the side (just enough) and finally, Hannibal could see.

        He was shamelessly bound, like him, with straps and locks and chains that kept him tied tight to the wheelchair; a matching see-through guard clung to the bottom half of his face, a window to a rosy mouth and the curve of a stubbled chin that Hannibal had only seen in his dreams and drawings for so long. Under the jacket, Hannibal’s nails clawed at his sides, fingers desperately straining to tear the other free from the trusses.

        His patience held when the orderly’s pushed Will (mind-numbing slow) further across the landing, yet snapped when they parked him far out of preferred range. With his age, his eyesight had grown more or less imprecise and from the distance set he could barely make out the sheen from Will’s scars or the curls of his hair.

        “Mr. Graham’s exportation was handled exactly as yours was,” the suited man said, his voice tentative, like a reassurance, and oddly split as though he couldn’t figure out which of the two men she was meant to be talking to. “Ah, and the same arrangement has been applied to him as well.”

        Hannibal did not turn as the suited man spoke. Every sound around him now was far away, mute, and his sight funneled into a blur, Will the only pinprick of clarity remaining, a spot in the distant he couldn’t keep his stare from.

        Will returned the look, unblinking, unmoving, blue rounds dotted by a dilated black pupil. Neither reacted more than this, a look, just a look. (No smiles, shouts of joy, no emotion. They would let nothing be seen.) And yet both could read the words years and years of silence had built laden in the others eyes _._

        “Dr. Lecter,” the Senator addressed him then. She stepped closer gestured to the suited man. He undid his briefcase quietly and handed off a sheet of paper. She too it, raised it in the air. “I have here an affidavit guaranteeing both you and Mr. Graham’s new rights.” A pause, where the paper was held out by her steady hand. “If…you’d wish to read it over before I sign.”

        Hannibal glanced at the document briefly before rejoining Will’s gaze. It held strong, still unshaken. He waited, watched him, read him, and only then did he answer:

        “That won’t be necessary. So much time has been wasted already. To spend what might be left of poor Catherine’s life bargaining for petty privileges would be a true offense.” He paused to take in the fallen, almost nauseous look that overcame the Senator, then added, “To reunite a mother and her child is my privilege. You have my trust, let me be of service to you now.”

        The Senator swallowed wetly, mouth a tight straight line. “Thank you,” she whispered.

        Hannibal looked to Will again, the back. “What I know of Buffalo Bill is abstract,” he began. “I do not know his name, nor what he looks like, but I know his kind. He is a deviant sexual predator who uses these women—Catherine—to fulfill repressed fantasies of death.”

        “But…” the Senator cut in. “Why Catherine? Why would he…” Her question trailed off as she sniffed roughly and rake a hand over her mouth.

        “He chooses women because he is misogynist,” Hannibal continued. “Bill despises them and finds pleasure demeaning them and brutalizing them. He is also, what you would call…a fame whore. He wants to be known. He wants to be famous for the work he does.” He took a breath and let his body strain against his restraints. “And, a person like that always leaves a trademark.”

        “And his is?” the Senator asked and a hush seemed to engulfed all as they waited for the answer.

        Hannibal blinked slowly and his next words even slower. In the shadow of his mind, he could imagine the smell of graphite and the finishing on copy paper; imagine his cell, his desk, his bars, and Clarice Starling standing beyond them—

        “Insects,” he finally said, and from the corner of his eye, he could see the smallest of smiles ease its way onto Will’s face.

              

 


End file.
